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Opinions

Opinions

Liang '19: Brown’s new health insurance disappoints

This summer, students received word that Brown is switching the management of its student health insurance plan to Gallagher Student Health, an insurance company that provides plans for a multitude of universities nationwide. While this might seem like a technicality, the change creates another difficult ...


Opinions

Mitra '18: Harriet Tubman deserves top billing

On the one hand, we have Harriet Tubman, a humanitarian and abolitionist who dedicated her life to fighting for the freedom of enslaved people. She risked her life as a spy for the Union Army, spent years guiding others to liberty and eventually became the most famous “conductor” on the Underground ...


Opinions

Letter: Pokanoket land

To the Editor: As a Brown University graduate, I am appealing to President Christina Paxson P’19 and Brown’s leadership/administration to return the 375 acres they currently “own” in Bristol to the Pokanoket tribe. (This land was donated to Brown by the Haffenreffer family in the 1950s, according ...


Opinions

Kumar ’17: Rescued from the hurricane

On Aug. 29, First Lady Melania Trump grabbed the national spotlight by opting to wear stilettos before departing to survey the damage wrought by Hurricane Harvey. Though she changed into tennis shoes upon arrival, the image of a luxury shoe-clad first lady preparing to greet Texans who had lost everything ...


Opinions

Bustos '16: Contested claims

As a former high school and college student, I was privileged to visit the land at 300 Tower Street in Bristol many times. Every summer, the University hosts the Brown Environmental Leadership Lab, a two-week program for high school students. In 2011, I was a BELL student, and, in 2013, I worked as ...


Opinions

Jaclyn Torres: Finding friendship through food

You can learn a lot about a person over a meal. My best friends at Brown share my love of food and, in many cases, a similar eating schedule. Every fall, I cherish the inaugural dinner of the semester, before classes start and when the only people in the dining halls are athletes and students participating ...

JaclynTorres_COJaclynTorres

Opinions

Lindsey Taing: Chill out

I entered Brown with big aspirations, wide eyes and a hope for something incredible. Like many of my peers, I was the valedictorian and president of many different clubs in high school. But after my freshman year, I soon realized that almost every Brown student was accustomed to past success. Brown ...


Opinions

Julia Stemmer: Play It Right (Sylvan Esso)

I cannot begin to quantify the number of parties I have attended with Steff and Stefan where we have taken over the music. From tiny dorm rooms to large bars, the three of us are constantly arriving somewhere, deciding we want to hear something different and asserting our musical tastes on everyone ...


Opinions

Lainie Rowland: Anything but a cheesy column

My senior year of high school I wrote a paper for my AP Language class trying to figure out what makes going to college worth the money. I could not actually answer the question, so the resulting paper was tragically bad. I argued that experiences combined with academics define college, making it a ...

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Opinions

Jia-hong Sun: You Are A Little Self-Conscious

You bend down to tie your laces. You think the shoes are funny-looking. They are made of cowhide, and you have never worn ones like these before. You are traveling to America! Better wear something nice! You giggle at their old-fashioned ideas. You stand up and twist the door knob. Light cascades into ...

JiahongSun_COJiahongSun

Opinions

Taneil Ruffin: Homesickness

Homesickness has plagued me for longer than I would like to admit. One of my only memories from pre-school is crying by the classroom door after my mom dropped me off for the day. Once my parents went back to Pennsylvania after visiting me during family weekend of my sophomore year of college, I got ...

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Opinions

Daniel Murage: A friend and a book

I have often been asked what my favorite book is or asked friends what their favorite books are. This is always a curious question, mostly because it offers an opportunity to learn about what the other person cares about without having to make them feel uncomfortable. In this same fashion, I will give ...

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Opinions

David Lazris: Brown in a quarter century

In 1982, an incoming freshman from New Jersey met his roommate, an international student from Pakistan. In their initial conversation, Andy Lazris ’86 and Syed Ejaz Husain ’86 MD’90 both quickly acknowledged that neither of them drank, but they agreed to begin college anew, attending a frat party ...

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Opinions

Nikhil Kumar: Atlas

In high school, I started a Tumblr account with the username, “peoplecartographer.” I titled the blog “Atlas” and wrote a short description: “A collection of maps. An exploration of the world.” My posts featured maps I found online — including a map of terms used in the United States to ...

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Opinions

Fatima Husain: The changing of the generations

Making your way to the top of College Hill is not always easy. In the fall of 1982, fresh off his flight from Islamabad, Pakistan and totally alone, Syed Ejaz Husain ’86 MD’90 trekked up the uneven cobblestone sidewalk with his suitcase encasing all of his belongings for college. The young international ...

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Opinions

Vicky Ding: Baby shoes

Inspired by the mother of the protagonist Sam in “Transformers 2,” my dad proudly paraded through Keeney on orientation day with my baby shoes around his neck (or “baby booties,” as Sam’s mom calls them). I took my first steps in these tiny red shoes. They flew with me across the Pacific from ...

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Opinions

Kumar '17: Leaving Brown, and hate, behind

With Commencement just 31 days away, many of my fellow seniors find themselves in the throes of a full-blown existential crisis. Last September, I wrote myself “A pep talk for senior year,” in which I found cause for optimism despite “a general sense that the world into which we were born is dissolving ...


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Campbell '19: Avoiding cities won’t solve politics

In the wake of the 2016 election, numerous articles were written placing at least part of the blame for Hillary Clinton’s defeat on America’s urbanites — simply for living where they do. City-dwellers, the logic went, were essentially self-gerrymandering, diminishing their political impact by ...




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