More a love letter than an op-ed, I write with a deep April heartache for beloved, far-flung Brunonia and a suffering world. Everywhere, everything has changed. College Hill is now oddly quiet, despite a loud riot of daffodils and magnolias defiantly gathered to bloom. 

Amid the panic and fear caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, college students everywhere have been left in limbo about the trajectory of their academic careers. The most prominent concern I have encountered among students is the impact the global crisis might have on their academic success.

In recent days, there has been a call for all courses to switch to mandatory S/NC grading as a measure to “achieve real equality,” claiming that the loss of our on-campus community and access to resources necessitates the implementation of a forced pass/fail semester.

On March 20, Brown University announced that they would no longer pay student workers after Saturday, April 4, if students could not continue their on-campus jobs remotely.

As the majority of students depart from campus, entering into new environments with new routines, I fear that remote learning will amplify the inequalities among our student body.

Last fall, I watched a livestream of the Whitney Museum filling with smoke. The smoke emanated from bundles of sage burned by members of Decolonize This Place, an activist collective based in New York City advocating for the removal of Warren Kanders ’79 P’23 from the board of the museum.

Recently, I participated in a screening of the film “Black Like Me.” The event was hosted at Brown University’s Manning Chapel by the Office of the Chaplains and Religious Life.

The Feb. 24 Brown Daily Herald article announcing that the Brown Band will not perform at women’s basketball games to protest the head coach was chilling. Citing and reporting “allegations circulating” and “things we were hearing,” the band and The BDH threatened the career of a well-respected coach and educator.

Democrats in many states have committed to defending voter rights and increasing turnout as Republicans make efforts to disenfranchise voters. Stacey Abrams, the 2018 Democratic nominee for Governor of Georgia, recently launched Fair Fight, an organization working to build voter protection in states across the country.

This Thursday, the state Senate Judiciary Committee is set to hear public commentary on S.2007, a joint resolution to inaugurate an independent redistricting commission in Rhode Island.