Phillip Gara '08
I would change student organization funding. I would make it easier for student organizations to get funding at earlier entry levels. I've seen a few student organizations, or even student institutions, get funding cut. This isn't necessarily a student organization, but intramural sports has had its funding cut in half, basically. I think that it's an institution that should get adequate funding - it's important to campus life, and for the University, it's sort of nickels and dimes to be cutting that sort of thing.
Leona Rosenblum '09I think I would have people participate more during class and especially in sections and seminars. I feel like a lot of the time people don't feel like they want to contribute to the conversation and just allow the professor to speak and don't really engage in the class. I think when you get kids involved it's a lot more of an exciting environment and you learn a lot more.
Roslyn Bogan '08I would improve the transfer program, the transfer orientation and integration. Perhaps I'd create transfer units or group transfers together so they can have a network when they first move on to campus.
Brian Huang '06 MD'10As a med student, I feel we need a facility of our own. Right now they're putting us in Biomed Center, which is predominately an undergrad building, and a building for research. We don't have, as many other medical schools have, a building that we can actually call our home, where we have classes and labs. Right now, the 2nd years are put in Smith-Buonanno. We have one lecture hall and everyone else is an undergrad. It doesn't feel like it's an actual medical school. I guess they're working on that in the Jewelry District right now, but as of right now, if I could just somehow speed that process up to just have some sort of building for Brown Medical School.
I was a PLME, so I was an undergrad here at Brown as well. One of the biggest gripes I had as an undergrad was review sessions, as random as that sounds. Review sessions held by professors are never prepared. You always just go there and they ask if anyone has any questions. One person has a question that half the class doesn't even care about, but yet they spend 20 minutes on that topic. If professors could just get it that a review session should be a review session. They should just run A-Z, an overview of what you need to know, but I've never seen that happen here.
Elizabeth Zerofsky '07 GSBrown should have more funding available for students to pursue unpaid or minimally-paying summer internships and projects. 35 BIAPs for a population of 6,000 undergrads is verging on the absurd - and not everyone wants to sell their soul to Goldman Sachs! If Brown really wants to become more competitive among the Ivy League, it should look to the sorts of financial resources that other universities who charge $40,000 per year make available to their students.
