This summer, when I began my new role as Brown’s vice president for campus life, I shared with students and families that my sense of belonging at Brown was formed in my residence hall. My first-year floormate and I came from entirely different worlds, yet the community we built together shaped my student experience, and my understanding of the power and responsibility that come with living in community. It is through this lens that I approach the work across the Division of Campus Life.
Brown’s recent and ongoing updates to housing and student organization practices are intended to ensure equitable, policy-aligned access to all University-sponsored opportunities while also preserving and strengthening affinity-based communities, because both equal access and communities of belonging are essential for students to thrive at Brown. Ensuring equitable access is not simply a legal requirement: It is a value rooted in our history as a place where openness, community-building and academic exploration go hand in hand. It is not a check-the-box task, but an ongoing commitment that requires continual review, thoughtful adjustments, collaboration and clear communication.
To help our students and student groups flourish, we must honor two responsibilities that inform and strengthen each other: our commitment to equal access, and our dedication to diversity, inclusion and belonging. Brown’s commitment to equal access means that University-sponsored programs and opportunities must be open and accessible to all students, consistent with nondiscrimination laws and policies. Themed programs, communities and affinity centers are both permissible and valued, but participation cannot be conditioned on identity.
Over the past several years, we have been diligent in reviewing practices to ensure continued compliance and alignment with our values. Brown’s commitments in this area — and our compliance with federal nondiscrimination laws such as Title VI and Title IX — have remained constant, even amid a changing landscape. The 2023 Supreme Court ruling on affirmative action fundamentally transformed the legal framework for how race and other aspects of identity may be considered in higher education. Throughout the end of 2023 and early 2024, the University commissioned an external Title VI compliance review and incorporated its recommendations. In 2024, the University outlined a set of concrete actions to foster an environment free of discrimination and harassment and to ensure compliance with federal and state laws related to Title VI of the Civil Rights Act. In July 2025, Brown’s federal resolution agreement reaffirmed the University’s existing practices related to Title VI and Title IX.
Brown’s decades-long commitment to diversity, inclusion and belonging is central to fulfilling its mission. This commitment has shaped many of our most cherished communities, such as the Sarah Doyle Center, celebrating its 50th anniversary this year, the Brown Center for Students of Color, celebrating 50 years in 2026, and the LGBTQ Center at Stonewall House, which opened its new building in 2022. All of these, as well as programs like the BCSC’s Third World Transition Program, commonly known as TWTP, are open to all who wish to engage, while centering the voices, experiences and histories of their communities.
When I stepped into my new role this past July, I embraced the responsibility of balancing those two commitments and continuing this work. I have picked up the themes of equitable access, diversity, inclusion and belonging, and worked with staff across our division to advance the ongoing review of our processes. My priorities have included continuing to expand the Community Dialogue Project to increase dialogue across difference, examining the Office of Chaplains and Religious Life to better facilitate interfaith engagement, reassessing how the Office of Residential Life administers housing selection to increase access and equity and reviewing how we describe our work, including student organizations connected with the Student Activities Office.
Recently, I have received many questions from students, alums and parents focused on the last two areas.
For program and theme housing communities, the proposed shift to a simplified, lottery-based selection process reflects our commitment to equitable access while continuing to support and celebrate communities that center particular histories, cultures, and experiences. Students have told us directly that past processes felt opaque or vulnerable to favoritism. A blinded selection process — such as a lottery among students who express a clear commitment to a community’s mission — offers more fairness, transparency and accessibility for any student who wishes to engage.
At the same time, what makes these communities vibrant will not change. Program houses will continue to center the interests and values that define them. They will remain student-led and mission-driven. Traditions, mentoring, storytelling and shared rituals will continue. Current members and leaders who wish to stay in their community will have pathways to do so. Our commitment to sustaining communities of belonging remains steadfast.
In 2022, for example, the University committed to establishing a residential program house focused on “community building for Native and Indigenous students and those with an interest in Native and Indigenous studies and the historical and contemporary experiences of Indigenous peoples.” This housing community — and the work that animates it — will continue.
Over the past several weeks, staff in the Office of Residential Life have been meeting with program and theme house leaders to listen, answer questions and gather suggestions. These conversations are ongoing, and student partnership will remain central as we shape how the process is implemented. Our immediate focus is on ensuring that specialized housing aligns with Brown’s policies and provides equal access. We will continue reviewing these processes for Greek organizations, which operate under a different structural framework.
Selection alone does not create the power of these communities: Their strength comes from the programming, dialogue, activism, cultural celebration, care and leadership that students practice every day. In our discussions with program house leaders, we are also taking time to understand how ResLife can better support and amplify this work.
For more than a year, the SAO has been working with student organizations to ensure compliance with non-discrimination laws and policies. Affinity spaces — including those connected to student organizations — are central to student life at Brown. They will continue to center and celebrate the histories, experiences and cultures that define their purpose. The SAO’s role is to partner with student leaders to ensure their mission statements and event descriptions clearly express their goals while avoiding unintended barriers to participation, and to invite all interested students to take part.
Affinity-based communities and the pride, safety and belonging they create are not abstract to me. They shaped my path. As a Program in Liberal Medical Education alum, a Black woman in medicine and someone who has spent a career building spaces where all students can thrive, I understand why these conversations can be emotionally charged. I also understand the legal and institutional responsibilities Brown must uphold, regardless of any political climate. Holding those truths together is not easy. But it is possible. And it is necessary.
I know change can be unsettling, and that some students and alums fear that something essential may be lost. I want to assure them: Brown’s commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion is unwavering. It is woven into our history, our mission and our future.
What we are doing now, and what we have been doing for years, is strengthening the foundation that allows these communities to endure. A thriving academic community depends on inclusivity: the freedom to learn from one another, to build connections across differences and to participate fully in all parts of campus life.
My own life is an example of this work in action. The friendship my first-year floormate and I built across very different lived experiences has lasted more than 30 years. It reminds me that when students have the opportunity to come together with openness and generosity, community takes root in ways none of us can predict.
That is the spirit guiding this work: a belief that community grows stronger when every student has a fair opportunity to find connection, meaning and a place to belong. I invite students to stay engaged with me in this work and in the conversations ahead.
Patricia Poitevien ’94 MD’98 is an associate professor of pediatrics and the vice president for campus life. She can be reached at patricia_poitevien@brown.edu. Please send responses to this op-ed to letters@browndailyherald.com and other opinions to opinions@browndailyherald.com.
