Students may feel as though they are surrounded only by their peers in residential halls, but someone older is usually only steps away. The University's faculty fellows and community directors programs are designed to integrate adults into student life and ensure that they are available to help students.
Through the faculty fellows program, professors living in University-owned properties on campus are available to students for conversation, advice or a break from studying.
"We are not trying to give Brown students more to do - we are trying to give them better things to do," said Associate Professor of Chemistry and Biochemistry J. William Suggs, who is the faculty fellow for Keeney Quadrangle.
Suggs said weekly study breaks can feature special topics such as summer internships, visits by representatives of campus resources such as the Chaplain's Office, guest speakers or simply conversation.
In the past, the Hewlett Foundation and the Office of the Dean of the College have funded special faculty fellow programs to promote diversity, such as a trip to the Black Repertory Theater, Suggs said, adding that the Dean of the College continues to fund special events. About seven or eight speakers are being considered for this semester, he said.
Suggs said one of the challenges of planning events is balancing the desire to offer something intellectual with students' desire to relax.
"Students are intellectual enough from nine-to-five, so in the evenings they just want to kick back, relax and have fun," he said.
Stephen Foley '74 P'04 P'07, associate professor of English, said he and his wife Mary Jo '75 GS'99 P'04 P'07 wanted to be faculty fellows after their experiences as undergraduates. He is the faculty fellow for east campus, encompassing Perkins Hall, Young Orchard and Barbour Hall and Apartments.
"As students, we enjoyed that kind of community programming. ... It seemed like a good way to get involved in student life, and my wife and I, as alumni, thought it was a natural for us," Foley said.
Foley said his weekly study breaks are especially important for first-years living in Perkins, because the residential hall lacks common space for students to meet.
Suggs and Foley both said the faculty fellows program provides students with the warmth of a home.
"There is something about opening up a home to students that creates a different atmosphere. It's a matter of very simple things like rugs, curtains, non-institutional food, dogs and young children. It's a break from the more institutional aspects of dormitory life," Foley said.
Foley added that the unique comfort of a home is particularly valuable in times of campus or national anxiety.
Faculty fellows say one of the highlights of the program for professors is being able to interact with students from different disciplines. Students likewise benefit from meeting a professor whose class they may never take, they say.
"As a chemistry professor, I see a limited range of Brown students. One of the great things about being a faculty fellow is that I can interact with a broader range of students," Suggs said.
Foley said his undergraduate experience at Brown was shaped by regular interaction outside of the classroom with professors, almost of all of whom lived near campus. With most of the faculty now living farther away, the faculty fellows program is an important way to allow the faculty-student interaction to continue outside of an academic setting, he said.
Both Foley and Suggs said they regularly host students from their classes for dinner in their homes.
The faculty fellows program uniquely integrates a professor's family life into the college experience. Foley said he raised his children, Nicholas '04 and Benjamin '07, while he was a faculty fellow.
"They have a keenly developed sense of college fashion and music. They learned early on all the different kinds of things that happen on a college campus besides classes," he said.
Faculty fellows live in University-owned properties without cost, in exchange for hosting weekly study breaks and being available to students, Suggs and Foley both said.
The University's community directors, meanwhile, provide a very different kind of support to students.
Community directors, all of whom are Brown graduate students, supervise residential peer leaders, oversee crisis management and ensure the well-being of residents, said Chung Nguyen GS, the community director for upper Keeney Quad.
Community directors also act as a liaison between residents and various University departments, including the Office of Student Life, the Department of Public Safety, the Department of Facilities Management, Health Services and Psychological Services, Nguyen said.
B. Afeni Cobham, assistant dean of student life and residential programs and director of the RPL program, said the program "came about to enhance our first-year residential programs, in particular to give our counselors someone they can go to for support and to help them troubleshoot the many and various issues they deal with as counselors."
Though community directors rarely work directly with residents, they play an important role in supporting RPLs, who include residential counselors, minority peer counselors and women peer counselors in first-year dorms and residential programmers in some upper class dorms, including the Graduate Center, Vartan Gregorian Quadrangle, Wriston Quadrangle, New Pembroke I and II and Barbour, Cobham said.
"I think that the added element of contact, to have your supervisors live with you and be there as a constant presence, is a really good support network for our RPLs," she said.
Both Cobham and Nguyen said the program gives parents comfort in the knowledge that an adult is looking after their children.
"I think from a parental perspective, it is nice to know that no matter the time of night, there is an adult I can talk to about what is going on with my son or daughter," Cobham said.
For Nguyen, being a community director is a valuable learning opportunity.
"I come from another country and another culture. This is the first time that I have lived in an undergraduate dorm in an American university. This is a very new experience for me," he said, adding that training in crisis management and mediation will also be useful outside of Brown's residential halls.
Nguyen also said a part of the attraction of being a community director is living in a residential hall environment.
"I really enjoy living in Keeney. I love living in a place where people are always around. ... It is very convenient because I have easy access everywhere on campus," he said.
Each community director is provided a stipend, a rent-free apartment in a residential hall and, in some cases, graduate course credit, Cobham said.
