An adolescent owl that was found stuck in a concrete mixer in southwestern Utah is finally on the mend, flying free and maybe a bit wiser from the ordeal.

The great horned owl somehow made his way into the truck-mounted mixer in late October and was discovered by workers pouring concrete at a resort construction site.

Lucky for him, a series of people gave a hoot about his predicament. Workers hosed the bird down before it was wrapped in a towel.

It took days for employees at the Best Friends Animal Sanctuary in Kanab to pick the concrete from the bird’s face, chest and right wing, using forceps to carefully crack the dried debris and cleaning the feathers with toothbrushes and dish soap.

The owl started its long recovery at an aviary run by the organization, and employees anxiously waited for it to grow new feathers. But the bird didn’t molt as predicted.

In early May, he underwent a procedure called imping, which uses adhesive to graft donor feathers onto existing shafts.

“The first few feathers were extremely nerve-wracking, but as we got into the groove, the imping became more comfortable, and everything went smoothly,” said Bart Richwalski, a supervisor at the sanctuary.

Great horned owls typically have tufting on the edges of some of their feathers that allows them to fly quietly as they hunt.

But the concrete frayed the rescued owl’s feathers and caused it to make a whooshing sound while flying.

To prepare for the imping procedure, sanctuary staff examined the owl’s feather patterns every few weeks and snipped damaged shafts in advance.

The owl was anesthetized and the donor feathers from a similarly sized owl that had died were laid out nearby to replicate each wing.

The staff then cut the feathers to the necessary length, lined them up and adhered them to the bird.

By the end of the 90-minute procedure, the owl had 10 new primary feathers and a secondary feather on his right wing. But then came the real test: could he fly silently?

The bird was placed in a large aviary to recover from the anesthesia and quickly took flight after awakening.

Richwalski used a decibel meter to measure the sound of the owl’s wingbeat and determined its flight was quiet enough for it to safely be released.

The owl hovered for a moment while the aviary roof was retracted, gained speed and then flew out into the wild.

“It feels so, so good. I think my heart finally started beating again. The nervousness was starting to overtake the excitement, but once I saw him fly out that opening in the roof, it just was, it was a sight to see. It was so fun,” said Richwalski, who has cared for the owl since picking him up at the construction site.

Karla Bloem, executive director of the Minnesota-based International Owl Center, said imping has been practiced by falconers “for eons” and is a very effective treatment.

“I’ve never heard of it not lasting, because you use some pretty good stuff when you’re doing imping,” said Bloem, who has studied great horned owls for nearly three decades.

She added that it would be OK if a couple of the grafted feathers fell out. The bulk of them just need to stay put until the owl can grow new ones in the coming summer months.

“And now it just needs to figure out, ‘whoa, I’m back in the big world again, hunting,’” she said. “Find a territory … you know, find one of the opposite sex and settle down and have kids.”

SALT LAKE CITY (ABC4) — Happy Friday, Utah! Our Friday afternoon will feature pleasant conditions across the area.

Today’s weather: Sunshine and pleasant temps

Daytime highs will warm into the upper 70s for our Friday afternoon. Southwest Utah will see daytime highs in the low to mid 90s Friday afternoon.

Tommorow’s weather: Stout cold front

An approaching cold front will bring some extra clouds and gusty southwest winds to the state for our Saturday. A Fire Weather Warning has been issued for Grand County along with most southern Utah south of I-70 Saturday.

West and southwesterly winds will be sustained between 15-25 MPH on Saturday with wind gusts between 35-50 MPH. The gusty winds and relative low humidity levels will lead to an elevated fire danger across southern parts of the state.

A few isolated showers will develop Saturday across portions of central and eastern Utah, with partly cloudy skies developing across northern Utah. Daytime highs on Saturday will warm into the lower 70s across the Wasatch Front. Highs will warm near 90° across southwest Utah.

Looking ahead: Frost and freeze concerns

The cold front moves through Saturday evening, bringing a deeper surge of cooler conditions to Utah late this weekend. Daytime highs will only be in the 50s on Sunday and Monday. The core of the storm arrives Sunday bringing widespread rain showers across northern Utah.

As colder air rotates into the state Sunday evening, rain showers will likely change over to snow showers for our mountain locations across the state through Monday morning. Snow levels look to drop as low as around 6,000 FT, including some mountain valleys.

Some light to moderate snow accumulations looks possible for the mountain valleys and mountain areas, with a better shot of seeing 6″+ for places like the Upper Cottonwoods and the Western Uintas. The good news is that road temperatures will be quite warm, so no major travel impacts are expected for most areas. Still, could see the accumulations on elevated surfaces by early Monday morning.  

We will likely have to deal with a few mornings of frost and freeze concerns for some of our valleys into early next week. Currently, looks like the period to watch will be Monday morning and again on Tuesday morning.

High pressure builds behind this system by the middle of next week bringing the return of sunshine and moderating temperatures to Utah.

by Olivia Sanchez, The Hechinger Report
May 15, 2026

OGDEN, Utah — The syllabus in 18-year-old Madelynn Wells’ introductory film studies class assigned “Jaws” first, and then the Spanish dark comedy “Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown.” She said she watched those, and did the written assignments with no problem. 

Around the third week of the term, the assignment was a film called “Pariah.” She hadn’t heard of it, so she looked it up and found that it was a coming-of-age film about a young woman who turned away from her conservative family to live as a lesbian.

Wells, a freshman at Weber State University who said she’s a devout Catholic and a political conservative, felt uneasy. She didn’t want to watch the film, and the idea of writing a paper on it made her even more uncomfortable. 

“I feel like whenever you put something in writing it just feels more serious,” Wells said. 

She decided to drop the class. 

In Utah, with a large and devout religious population, Wells is not alone in trying to uphold her religious beliefs while getting a college education. 

A new state law offers these students a unique protection: If something in a class conflicts with their strongly held religious or personal beliefs, students can ask their professor for an alternative assignment or exam. And as long as their request doesn’t change the fundamental nature of the course, the professor is now required by law to allow the student to opt out. 

The law has some guardrails that protect against accommodation requests that are universally considered absurd. For example, a student won’t be able to claim a moral objection to math in a college algebra course. And the law requires faculty to make these accommodations only in courses that are part of a college’s general education requirement or are required for the student’s major.

Despite those protections, the law is polarizing. Proponents say that students shouldn’t be required to do assignments or take exams on topics that compromise their morals unless it’s absolutely necessary to advance in their field of study. Opponents argue that engaging with beliefs they don’t hold helps students understand their own views better. 

This Utah law is the first of its kind targeting higher education, but it’s an extension of concerns being expressed at the K-12 level. There have been efforts to emphasize conservative and religious values in public schools, and limit what can be taught about subjects including racial history, gender and sexuality. The Utah law is also reminiscent of a case the Supreme Court took up last year, in which the justices sided with parents of public school students who wanted to take their children out of class during lessons that violate their religious beliefs — such as using books about LGBTQ+ identities. President Donald Trump has said that colleges are “corrupting our youth and society with woke, socialist, and anti-American ideology.” 

And over the past few years, there have been dozens of state-level bills — including one in Utah — banning initiatives or programs that promote diversity, equity and inclusion, or DEI. Lawmakers in other states have gone after what’s taught in the classroom and how certain issues, like race and gender identity, are discussed. The legislative approach here is different. Instead of dictating what can or cannot be taught, the new Utah law shifts the power to students who now have the agency to decide when curriculum crosses a line for them. 

Amy Reid, who directs the Freedom to Learn initiative at the free speech advocacy organization PEN America, said it’s the responsibility of faculty to help all students get the most out of what’s being taught. Some accommodations — like those for students with disabilities or religious students who need to reschedule exams for religious holidays — help faculty meet that goal, she said. This one, she said, does not. 

Rather than “encourage students to shut their eyes or plug their ears or throw a book out the window,” she said, “You encourage students to engage with ideas, and you provide them with the support that they need — which can be different for individual students — so that they are able to complete the work.”

“Being exposed to ideas that you disagree with doesn’t mean you’re going to change your mind, but it should make you clearer about what it is that you believe and why,” Reid added.

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Wells, a zoology major, was taking the film course to fulfill a general education arts credit. After dropping it, she had more than two dozen other classes to choose from to earn that credit. She picked photography. 

But if she had needed the course to graduate, she said she would have had to swallow her discomfort or work up the courage to talk to her professor about an alternative assignment. In the case of the film studies course, perhaps she could have watched a different coming-of-age film, or another film by a Black screenwriter — depending on the goal of that assignment. (Her professor declined to comment.) 

Seth Mulkey, a junior at Utah State University in Logan, said he felt uncomfortable in his general education biology class when the course topic turned to evolution. Mulkey, an evangelical Christian, said he believes that God created the Earth in seven days.

“It can be a bit disheartening to have to learn about something and have something proposed as fact when it’s not something that you’re in agreement with,” Mulkey said. He tries to keep his beliefs to himself and instead, he said, “I’ll do my best to engage from an intellectual standpoint with this idea. So, if this is the assumption we’re making about how this works, we’ll talk about it, we’ll see what conclusions are there.” 

Even if the law had been in effect when he took that biology class, Mulkey said he wouldn’t have asked for an accommodation to get out of uncomfortable group discussions. But writing assignments might have been a different story. 

“If the assignment were to write an essay supporting this view, write an essay about why evolution is correct and why it is the right view of the creation of the world — I think at that point, I would want to step back,” Mulkey said. 

Politicians say left-wing professors push their views. New poll shows students don’t see it that way

Utah appears to be the most religious state in the country. About 76 percent of Utah residents are religious, compared to only about 49 percent nationwide, according to a 2024 report from the Gardner Policy Institute at the University of Utah. Data from the Pew Research Center shows that about 50 percent of all residents are members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and another 13 percent identify as members of other Christian denominations. 

Michael J. Petersen, a Republican state representative from Logan, said the idea for the bill came after his daughter was assigned to write a letter to a legislator in support of LGBTQ+ rights as part of a master’s degree program at an out-of-state college. The assignment was in conflict with her beliefs, so she called her dad for help. 

He helped her write “something that was very, very bland.” She moved on — and he began drafting the legislation. 

Had Petersen’s daughter been an undergraduate student at a public college in Utah, the law would have helped her in two ways. It would have prohibited her instructor from requiring that she take a specific public stance (such as sending a letter) on anything that is a “political, social, religious, moral, or community matter.” And it would have allowed her to ask her professor for an alternative assignment.

Petersen said he believes that his daughter’s assignment was to write the letter and also send it. (The Hechinger Report was not able to independently confirm this.)

Most faculty and education advocates, whatever their politics, agree that requiring her to send the letter would be inappropriate.

Mike Gavin, the president and CEO of the Alliance for Higher Education, said it is reasonable for a professor to ask a student to take on other perspectives during an in-class debate or in a written assignment. But it shouldn’t be taken outside the classroom. 

“In no way, shape or form should they be required to publicly sign their names to something. That would be very problematic,” Gavin said. “That, I think, would be a personnel issue that an institution should handle. That is not an academic freedom issue. That is actually using students for things that are political.” 

And, he said, in 30 years in higher education he’s never heard of it happening. 

Gavin said he thinks it’s unnecessary to give students such broad permission to opt out of coursework that conflicts with their beliefs. There are cases in which it’s appropriate, but those already come up and are handled on a case-by-case basis between professors and students, he said. 

“It’s entirely probable — I say this facetiously and also seriously — that a freshman in college doesn’t know everything yet,” Gavin said. “They need to engage with ideas they have not come across. Even if they end up being uncomfortable for a minute, that doesn’t mean that they’re traumatized.” 

Conservative-leaning civic centers now teach courses at public colleges 

Outside of Utah, many people might gawk at the idea of students opting out of coursework that makes them feel uncomfortable, and worry about the broader implications of such a policy. But among Utahns, there seem to be wider-ranging and more nuanced perspectives.

It’s partly because they’ve been down this road before. In 1998, a Mormon theater student at the University of Utah objected to reading a script with profanity. The student sued the university, accusing faculty of essentially pushing her out after she was given the choice to recite the lines as written or leave the program. 

A settlement agreement required the university to write a policy to deal with coursework objections related to sincerely held beliefs. But the policy still requires that students be able to understand and articulate ideas and theories that are important to the course, regardless of whether they agree with or believe them. The new law does away with that requirement. 

High school speech and debate allows students to find common ground 

Sarah Projansky, the vice provost for faculty and academic affairs at the University of Utah and a professor of film and gender studies who has examined the representation of sexual violence in film and media, said she’s had students walk out of class film screenings during intense moments. If a student says they can’t watch a certain film, she says she works with them to find an alternative. 

“It’s not my business why a student can’t be there. Religion, sincerely held belief of conscience, memory, family memory. It doesn’t matter, they can’t be there,” Projansky said. “Anything that’s not pedagogically necessary is very easy to accommodate.”

Nicole Allen, a communications professor at Utah State, said she thought the law was “a solution in search of a problem,” given existing policies at public institutions and the fact that most professors are able to handle these issues on a case-by-case basis. 

Still, she thinks there’s no need for students to experience “gratuitous discomfort” in the name of academia, she said, as long as accommodations wouldn’t take away from the big-picture goals of the course. 

Although the law doesn’t concern what professors are allowed to teach, some worry that it could still influence academic freedom.

Reid, of PEN America, worries that faculty may overcorrect. They might leave controversial reading materials off their syllabuses or dodge subjects that tend to make students feel uncomfortable, in order to avoid consequences. Those range from the extra work of writing new assignments and test questions to the bureaucratic headache that comes with denying a request to, in the worst and least likely scenario, becoming caught up in a public controversy if a student takes issue with something they’re being taught. 

She said it makes sense that professors would not want to end up like Melissa McCoul, who was fired from Texas A&M University after a student recorded her teaching about gender identity, or Mel Curth, the graduate teaching assistant who lost her job at the University of Oklahoma after she failed a student who had turned in a poorly written psychology paper using only the Bible as a source. 

Behind the turmoil of federal attacks on colleges, some states are coming after tenure 

Though students can now choose to opt out of coursework on difficult topics, many Utah public colleges go to great lengths to encourage them to do the opposite outside the classroom. Many institutions host regular forums where students can come together for facilitated conversations on controversial topics and engage with classmates who hold differing opinions. Often, the colleges offer free lunch to incentivize students to dig into tough topics. 

At Weber State, the dialogue programming is run by the Walker Institute of Politics and Public Service. On a recent Wednesday, a group of students, staff, and current and retired professors came together at a long, conference room table to discuss the war in Iran over sub sandwiches and chips. 

Strict rules protect the integrity of conversations: Everyone has to read the same article, there’s to be no use of tech devices and no note-taking, and nothing that is said should be shared outside that space. 

Leah A. Murray, the institute’s director and a professor of political science and philosophy, said the rules exist so that everyone feels comfortable speaking freely. (The group made an exception to the no note-taking rule for the reporter in the room.) 

Sometimes Murray selects the topic, but sometimes the topic comes from a student.

Adam Nichols, a 43-year-old junior who is studying to become a high school teacher, said he proposed the idea to Murray because he wanted to be able to talk about the Iran conflict with people in his life, but he felt he didn’t quite have the language to feel comfortable doing so.

When he’s been forced to reckon with his strongly held beliefs, both in class and in various Walker Institute Talks, he said, “It forces me to reassess other areas where I may have been wrong. And I would much rather be wrong and be corrected than to continue under those false pretenses.” 

Despite her appreciation for difficult conversations with people she doesn’t necessarily agree with, Murray sees value in making the types of accommodations in the law. Her views are informed by her own experience as a vegan, animal-loving undergraduate who opted to fulfill her science requirement with geology instead of biology to avoid having to dissect a pig.

“I was unwilling to do that,” Murray said. “It was a violation of my conscience at that time.”

She said that experience has also informed the way she handles difficult issues with her students. At the beginning of each term, she says, “If you’re going to go to hell for learning this, please drop this class.”

She delivers it just like that, she said, and her students always laugh. But she’s serious. 

“I don’t want to be responsible for your salvation being denied because you learn something in this class.”

Contact staff writer Olivia Sanchez at 212-678-8402 or osanchez@hechingerreport.org. 

This story about religious beliefs and college students was produced by The Hechinger Report, a nonprofit, independent news organization focused on inequality and innovation in education. Sign up for the Hechinger newsletter.

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