Month: April 2025

After the Inferno dance on the night of April 12, students arrived at the fountain on Utah Tech University’s campus to find it blocked off by the Utah Tech Police, who told them True Trailblazer had been canceled.

Usually, the True Trailblazer tradition happens at the fountain after the homecoming football game in the fall and the Inferno dance in the spring. 

Luke Kerouac, the interim executive director of student engagement and leadership, said that while there was no administrative action to cancel the event, the Utah Tech Student Association did not sponsor the event.

“I know there are concerns with [True Trailblazer],” he said. “There are always concerns every year… we just asked [UTPD] to be up there and let [students] know the event is not happening.”

A since-deleted video on TikTok about True Trailblazer may have factored into the decision not to hold the event.

Kerouac said student safety is always taken into consideration when planning events.

“I think it’s important to remember that the administrators and those students planning those events really do have the best interest of the students in mind,” Kerouac said. “They want students to have [these] traditions all while being safe and accountable.”

Sergeant Juan Fulgencio is the special events coordinator for the Utah Tech Police Department and spearheaded the effort that night at the fountain. His job is to assess the security and safety needs on campus during large events. 

Fulgencio said that in previous years, there has been a police presence at True Trailblazer to help clear the area once the event is over, but this year was different. Twelve officers were present at Inferno while three were at the fountain, but more were asked to come help clear the students who showed up after expecting the event to take place as usual. 

“Throughout [Inferno], we have multitudes of officers roaming around,” he said. “Really, what we’re watching for is any kind of fights or disorderly activity.”

Fulgencio said using the buddy system at events like True Trailblazer is important to help avoid harmful situations.

“I would just make sure to understand the rules before you go there and have a safety plan,” he said. 

Similarly, Utah Tech’s Title IX Coordinator Hazel Sainsbury, said safety is in numbers.

“Go with people that you care about and friends that you have connections with,” Sainsbury said. “Have a plan on how you’re going to navigate the event together.”

Sainsbury’s job is to provide help to any students who have experienced discrimination or sexual misconduct, and she said the office has seen students struggle with their academic performance after some of these incidents have occurred. 

“My role is intervening in that process by providing them support measures and accommodations that would help them continue focusing on academics,” she said.

Sainsbury said it’s important to find ways to communicate with your friends if you feel unsafe in any situation, and to be aware of your surroundings.

“Let [the Title IX Office] see what we can do for you,” Sainsbury said. “We’re here to make sure that everyone has a productive and safe college experience.”

ChatGPT is offering its Pro subscription for free to university students until May 31. Students will have free access to advanced features like GPT-4 and OpenAI o1. 

AI programs like ChatGPT can be a useful study tool for students. In a survey from the Digital Education Council, 86% of students use AI to study, with 54% using AI on a weekly basis.

Students at Utah Tech University are allowed to use AI as a study aid according to official policies laid out in every course syllabus. UT policy recognizes the opportunities for innovation within AI, but states it cannot be used by students to submit plagiarized work.

“Generative artificial intelligence (AI) and associated technologies (e.g, ChatGPT, Perplexity, DALL-E2, etc.) have already brought to our campus significant opportunities for innovation in teaching and research along with concerns around the ethics of their implementation and utilization,” the policy said.

Alex Cutler, a senior software engineering major from St. George, works as a tutor who specializes in helping students use AI tools like ChatGPT responsibly.

“My advice would be don’t use it [AI] to do a whole final paper, but do use it to review rough drafts and peer reviews,” Cutler said. “AI will be helpful reviewing specific sections or a basic rundown of how a draft is looking.”

Miles Kindred, a junior marketing major from Layton, said he frequently uses AI as a study tool and has already signed up for the Pro subscription with ChatGPT. He uses the bot to make practice tests for exams.

“I’ll say ‘OK Chat, put something on the study guide that will help me solve this equation’ and I’ll keep having ChatGPT make me a study guide until I can take the test and just use the notes it gave me,” Kindred said.

Course policies also state that students may not use generative AI to submit as their own work, or else AI checkers will flag the submission and the student will have to meet with the instructor.

AI detection programs like GPTZero, Winston AI and AI Detector Pro will scan a piece of text and look for characteristics specific to AI writing styles. It flags things like a lack of consistency and coherence, human touch/creativity, and a lack of inconsistencies that show up in human writing.

Concerns about the use of AI detection tools to flag work worry some students on campus. The detection tools are imperfect at picking up AI work every time.

Cameron Dearing, a freshman general studies major from Ogden, said he has had some negative experiences with AI detectors in his courses.

“I plugged in my essay into a software that would read it back to me so I could listen to it, and I repasted it into the submission, so I had to go in and talk to her [my professor],” Dearing said. “It got flagged as 100% AI.”

AI tools can be used to complement the learning done in a classroom setting without replacing it.

Students who are interested in redeeming OpenAI’s offer of a free Pro subscription should be aware of how to use AI software as a tool that aligns with UT’s official policies. This will help them use it responsibly for studying this finals season.

The ninth annual Trailblazer Symposium hosted by the Utah Tech University Research Office celebrates research efforts across campus with the involvement of students, faculty, alumni and community members. It is a space where all can disseminate research projects, learn from other researchers to harness and practice public speaking skills, and make meaningful connections in the academic community.

The purpose of the Trailblazer Symposium is not only for students to be honored for their work, but also a career opportunity and learning experience that students can use to bolster their resume.

Breanna Blount, a senior criminal justice major from Las Vegas and intern for the Research Office, said she was involved in facilitating all parts of the Trailblazer Symposium. Blount said they’ve been preparing since the beginning of the semester, and involved effortful planning of presentation scheduling, registration, raffle prizes and catering.

Blount said, “As the Research Office, we want to be able to showcase student and faculty research in a way that isn’t really seen outside of events like this.”

The Trailblazer Symposium started the evening of April 18 in the Dolores Dore Eccles Fine Arts Center auditorium, where Michael Lacourse, provost and vice president of Academic Affairs, opened the event with welcoming remarks, reflecting on his commitment to the event over the past nine years and highlighting the importance of undergraduate research and the scientific process.

The recipients of the Distinguished Undergraduate Research Awards were invited on stage to present their research for the Ignite Talks. Each recipient was selected via faculty nomination to represent their college based on the originality, impact and rigor of their research.

Speakers presented their research in a fast-paced manner, with presentation slides that automatically advanced every 30 seconds for a total of five minutes. This challenged them to present their research in a concise and clear manner, showcasing their experience in conducting and presenting research.

Topics ranged from the use of AI in pre-service teachers in elementary education to the use of lighting in refining dance choreography.

After the opening remarks and Ignite Talks, students and faculty facilitated presentations across campus, where researchers presented their work to intimate audiences via oral presentations or fast-paced poster sessions.

Vinodh Chellamuthu, associate professor of math and director of the Research Office, said the Trailblazer Symposium featured over 140 presentations this year. This shows an ever-growing research community on campus, which furthers the mission of the Research Office.

Chellamuthu said: “If you think about it, no jobs are going to ask ‘Hey, do problem five from chapter five and I’ll give you a salary.’ Employers are actually looking for someone to use their classroom knowledge to solve messy real-world problems”.

Emma Johnson, a senior chemistry major from St. George and a presenter at the event, said her research involved finding ways to efficiently harvest water through atmospheric moisture with the intention to help with ongoing water needs, especially in areas like St. George.

“Getting the experience is super valuable to me,” Johnson said. “But I also think that it just helps you learn. I mean, applied learning is better than learning in a classroom, right?”