THE BROWN DAILY HER ALD
Apple Cinemas open at Providence Place, replacing Showcase
With 1-2 loss, women’s soccer barely qualifies for Ivy tournament
Studies help explain overestimations in Greenland Ice Sheet melting
Mooney ’29: Why doing less can help us accomplish more
11
Brown Ballroom Dance Team helps students find their rhythm
Condoleezza Rice encourages civil discourse, reflects on Israel-Hamas, Russia-Ukraine wars at lecture event
and the Russia-Ukraine wars.
BY MAYA NELSON UNIVERSITY NEWS & METRO EDITOR
Assuming the role of national security advisor in 2001 and later becoming secretary of state in 2005, Condoleezza Rice spent eight years shaping American diplomacy. Those years were marked by the Sept. 11 attacks’ impact on American and global security, as well as increased military intervention and high-stakes negotiations in the Middle East.
Now, over a decade after she left her post, Rice
— the first female national security advisor and the first African American woman to become secretary of state — visited College Hill on Wednesday to speak at the 105th Stephen A. Ogden Jr. ’60 Memorial Lecture on International Affairs. There — and in an interview with The Herald prior to the event — she reflected on the current state of American diplomacy and provided insight on the obstacles that she says remain in fostering a shared international security.
Reflecting on Israel-Hamas, Russia-Ukraine wars
During the lecture, Rice spoke with President Christina Paxson P’19 P’MD’20 about a number of today’s most pressing foreign policy issues, including the Is-
In the wake of the recent ceasefire agreement between Israel and Hamas, Rice said that “for the first time in a long time, we have a chance” to end the war.
As secretary of state, Rice was heavily involved in conflict mediations between Israel and the Palestinian territories and the larger Middle East region. In 2005, she worked to negotiate Israel’s withdrawal from the Gaza border, later assisting in negotiating a ceasefire agreement between Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon the year after.
Despite her optimism toward a resolution of the conflict, Rice emphasized that both Israelis and Palestinians must take steps for peace, she argued at the lecture event. Israel needs to acknowledge the potential for Palestinian statehood, and the Palestinian people
need a political authority to “take responsibility for Palestinian affairs,” she said.
“Bibi Netanyahu needs to say the words ‘Palestinian state,’” she added.
Rice also discussed the Russia-Ukraine War and the challenges of working with Russian President Vladimir Putin — a figure she said is key to ending the war.
“You couldn’t let him intimidate you,” she said during the lecture.
“I know you had my friend Hillary Clinton here,” Rice added, referencing the fellow former secretary of state’s visit to Brown last week. “She would tell you the same thing: He had two speeds — oppress and
The Woodhalls celebrate diversity, perseverance at Brown Lecture Board event
Expenditures on graduate programs will still increase
BY SAMAH HAMID SENIOR STAFF WRITER
Brown will reduce its overall Ph.D. admissions to around 80% of its current targets in an effort to regulate University operating costs, Provost Francis Doyle said at Tuesday’s faculty meeting.
When admitting this fall’s doctoral cohort, no Ph.D. program was reduced by more than two admissions slots beneath the program’s typical minimum size. But Doyle
said that this minimal reduction was “unsustainable” for this year’s admissions cycle.
If the University continues to admit doctoral students at a rate consistent with recent years, the cost to the University would increase by 7.3%, Doyle said.
President Christina Paxson P’19 P’MD’20 explained Brown’s expenditures on graduate programs will still increase, despite the planned reductions to program size, because many graduate students extended their time at Brown during the COVID-19 pandemic. She also attributed the cost to “rapid growth” in Ph.D. stipends.
Earlier this year, Doyle reported that stipends in the life and physical sciences have grown by 65%, and stipends in the humanities and social sciences have nearly doubled.
In preparation for the admissions reduction, the University adjusted doctoral programs’ target sizes for next year’s cohorts, Doyle explained. These reductions in cohort size were distributed “evenly across divisions,” but individual program reductions were distributed based on factors such as the number of applicants, selectivity, yield, student experience and
Duo discussed athletic success, eightyear relationship
BY LYDELL DYER SPORTS EDITOR
Attendees at the Brown Lecture Board’s semesterly talk rose to their feet as Tara Davis-Woodhall and Hunter Woodhall strolled, smiling, onto the stage of the Salomon Center’s De Ciccio Family Auditorium on Monday night.
Moderated by Brown Lecture Board President Samantha Chambers ’26, the hourlong conversation touched on the Woodhalls’ experiences with athletic success, navigating relationships and overcoming adversity.
Last year, the Woodhalls rose to the pinnacle of the track and field world, with Davis-Woodhall winning her first Olympic gold medal at the 2024 Paris Olympic Games, just weeks before Woodhall won his first gold medal at the 2024 Paralympic
Games.
Outjumping two-time world champion Malaika Mihambo, Davis-Woodhall clinched the top podium position in the long jump with a 7.10-meter effort. Rounding the lap in only 46.36 seconds, Woodhall took home the gold in the 400-meter event for the T62 class — a World Para Athletics designation for athletes with double below-theknee amputation who compete with prosthetics.
“Our prevailing mission isn’t just to bring really influential people to campus, but also to be able to respond to contemporary cultural moments and spark conversation across our student population,”
Chambers, a former Herald university news editor, wrote in an email to The Herald. “And I think the Woodhalls are super emblematic of that goal.”
Chambers opened the conversation by revisiting one of the defining moments of the 2024 Olympics — when Davis-Woodhall, after securing the gold medal, sprinted off the
field and leapt into the arms of her husband in celebration.
“It was a really personal, intimate moment,” Woodhall reflected. “What I didn’t know is that somebody across the stadium was filming, and so that whole moment, that whole experience, we both thought that we were the only ones to experience it.”
But the road to becoming Olympic and Paralympic champions was replete with adversity — experiences the duo believes have strengthened their resolve and influenced their lives.
Woodhall was born with fibular hemimilia, a condition in which the lower legs do not grow fibulas.
“My ankles were fused, I didn’t have a fibula bone and the initial reaction from doctors was that I’d never be able to walk because I had no function of my foot, ankle (or) calf,” Woodhall explained.
After a surgery in which both of Woodhall’s legs were amputated,
rael-Hamas
The Herald sat down with the former secretary of state before the Ogden Memorial Lecture
Former secretary of state Condoleezza Rice was the first female national security advisor.
VALEN GARCIA / HERALD
UNIVERSITY NEWS
New admissions welcome center opens in Manning Hall
Center aims to offer an immersive, welcoming starting point for tours
BY MILLIE BARTER CONTRIBUTING WRITER
On Monday, a new admissions welcome center opened on the first floor of Manning Hall. The space — which previously housed the Haffenreffer Museum of Anthropology — will serve as a starting point for campus tours.
The Galen V. Henderson Admission Welcome Center’s construction was entirely donor-funded, according to a University press release. The donors opted to remain anonymous, according to University Spokesperson Brian Clark.
The center’s name is a tribute to Galen Henderson MD’93, a trustee and graduate of the Warren Alpert Medical School who died in 2023.
Henderson “really embodied genuine friendship and support,” Associate Provost for Enrollment and Dean of Admission Logan Powell said. Henderson’s legacy is “really fitting of the spirit and the warmth” that Powell hopes the space will embody.
This addition to campus replaces the old welcome center in the Stephen Robert ’62 Campus Center, which served just as a checkpoint to sign in for tours rather than a dedicated welcome area.
“We didn’t have dedicated room and seating areas for families who might be travelling here from across the country or from outside the United States,” Powell told The Herald.
Now, Powell hopes the new center will be “warm and welcoming to everyone who’s visiting Brown.”
Brianna Montecalvo, the senior assistant director of visit and events, said the Campus Center desk won’t be immediately altered, but noted that her team is hoping to find creative ways to repurpose the space.
The new space in Manning will also accommodate information sessions in the second-floor chapel twice per day. The presentations aim to give prospective students an opportunity to become familiar with Providence and College Hill, the location of their potential new home, according to University officials.
The center features a map of campus on the wall, interactive screens where families can explore Brown’s concentration options, an admissions-specific brochure collection and an informational photo
display detailing the University’s history.
The center also includes unique architectural elements, including columns and walls made from a variety of materials and styles. It also features red brick — reminiscent of the Van Wickle Gates and residence halls — and wood paneling, mirroring the interior of the Granoff Center for the Creative Arts.
“The materials are … inspired by architectural styles that you’ll see when you take a campus tour,” Powell said. These details aim to add a sense of familiarity
for visitors when they return to the center at the end of a tour.
After months of construction, the center opened to the public Monday. “Our first day went really smoothly,” said Eliza Etter, the director of communications and outreach for the Office of College Admission. “Visitors were able to sit down and wait and be welcomed by students and staff in a way that we weren’t able to do at the Campus Center.”
Montecalvo added that campus tour guides seem to be adapting well. “They’re
taking a lot of pride in the space … and have a stronger sense of identity within their role now,” she noted.
Campus tour guide Tessa Rose Crowley ’26, who led one of the first tours out of the center on Monday, said that the new location offers “more of an approachable feel.”
“We’re not behind that giant wall of the initial Campus Center desk … which I think is making visitors feel like they can come up and speak to us,” Crowley added.
Federal judge dismisses lawsuit challenging deportation of Brown professor
Lawyers filed on behalf of Assistant Professor of Medicine Rasha Alawieh
BY CATE LATIMER UNIVERSITY NEWS EDITOR
On Friday, U.S. District Judge Leo Sorokin dismissed a case challenging Assistant Professor of Medicine Rasha Alawieh’s March deportation. The lawsuit, filed by her lawyers in May, questioned the expedited removal process during her deportation as well as the authority of the immigration officials involved.
Alawieh was deported to Lebanon after U.S. Customs and Border Patrol agents found “sympathetic photos and videos” of various Hezbollah leaders on her phone. The deportation was enforced despite Sorokin’s own March 14 ruling requiring notice of Alawieh’s removal and Alawieh holding an H-1B visa.
Hezbollah is a Lebanon-based group designated as a terrorist organization by the U.S. Department of State. Alawieh told federal agents that she supported the leaders religiously rather than politically.
“The relief Alawieh seeks in this action is beyond what this court can provide,” Sorokin wrote in the Oct. 31 ruling.
The amended lawsuit, filed by lawyers from Muslim Advocates and Massachusetts-based Marzouk Law, challenged the constitutionality of the expedited removal process rather than referring Alawieh’s case to an immigration court.
Her lawyers argued that Alawieh has “due process rights that render the application of expedited removal to her unlawful.”
“Alawieh’s experience exemplifies why permitting non-appointed employees to make life-altering decisions, insulated from any review, is inconsistent with our constitutional system,” the suit reads.
Alawieh had spent over six years studying and practicing medicine in the United States. As one of three transplant nephrologists in Rhode Island at the time, her colleagues at Brown University Health emphasized in the suit that her absence was “detrimental” to their program.
In a June filing in response to the lawsuit, the federal government had said the court lacked the jurisdiction to address the suit’s claims and recommended the court to dismiss the case.
This article originally appeared online at browndailyherald.com on Nov. 2, 2025.
ANISHA KUMAR / HERALD
Rasha Alawieh was deported to Lebanon after U.S. Customs and Border Patrol agents found “sympathetic photos and videos” of various Hezbollah leaders on her phone.
PHOEBE-GRACE ASEOCHE / HERALD
The new admissions center on Wednesday. This addition to campus replaces the old welcome center in the Stephen Robert ’62 Campus Center, which served just as a checkpoint to sign in for tours rather than a dedicated welcome area.
FROM PAGE 1
UNIVERSITY NEWS
career outcomes.
He recognized that data on these factors is “both imperfect and in flux,” explaining that these statistics will change as students graduate. Given this, no adjustments to cohort size were decided solely on this data, Doyle added.
Earlier this year, the University paused admissions for at least six humanities and social science Ph.D. programs
Last month, Doyle announced he had convened the Doctoral Education Working Group, a team of faculty members tasked with evaluating diverse input across campus to determine Brown’s goals and approaches toward doctoral education.
At Tuesday’s faculty meeting, Janet Blume, co-chair of the Doctoral Education Working Group and interim dean of the Graduate School, said the group’s goal is to “identify the central questions and key issues as we think about graduate education in this changing landscape.”
The group, she added, will first focus on contacting graduate programs with paused admissions to understand how faculty have been impacted. But in the future, the committee plans to hold meet-
ings with divisional chairs overseeing doctoral programs, faculty groups, clusters of departments, directors of graduate study and alums.
According to Blume, one of the group’s main focus areas is the student experience “in this moment of shifting job markets and shifting value of higher education.”
“We want to make sure everybody has meaningful, fulfilling jobs … and that their time here is rewarding,” she said.
Blume added that some faculty members have expressed concerns that “ending a graduate program might mean the end of a discipline, or be contributing to the end of a discipline.” She emphasized that the working group is “very sensitive” to this issue.
“As we look ahead, we want to, as I noted, be really careful in considering how Brown can continue to train the next generation of scholars,” Doyle said. “This is such a crucial part of our mission. We want to hear from faculty and students.”
This article originally appeared online at browndailyherald.com on Nov. 4, 2025.
Interim Dean of Graduate School, Deputy Provost Janet Blume to retire in June ADMINISTRATION
University officials have not announced who will step into Blume’s roles
BY ETHAN SCHENKER UNIVERISTY NEWS EDITOR
Interim Dean of the Graduate School and Deputy Provost Janet Blume will retire in June, Provost Francis Doyle announced in a Thursday Today@Brown message.
Blume, also an associate professor of engineering, took on the role of interim dean of the Graduate School in August after the departure of Thomas Lewis ’90. She joined Brown’s faculty in 1986 and became an administrator in 2011, when she was appointed associate dean of the faculty. Blume
has served as deputy provost since 2022.
“I am proud to have taught thousands of undergraduate and graduate students over the years and am honored to have been a part of their lives and educations,” Blume wrote in a message to Doyle shared in Thursday’s announcement.
Doyle wrote that in her administrative roles, Blume “has been a steadfast champion for Brown’s faculty and students, helping to devise and implement academic initiatives, spearheading special projects and guiding academic departments through periods of transition and renewal.”
Blume’s retirement comes at a time of change for Brown’s graduate programs. At a faculty meeting on Tuesday, Doyle said that the University planned to reduce PhD admissions by roughly 20%. Weeks earlier,
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The Herald reported that Brown had paused PhD admissions in at least six academic departments for the 2026-27 academic year. Doyle intends to announce plans “in the coming weeks for staffing the Office of the Provost” and expects to announce an appointment for a new dean of the Graduate School “before the end of the fall semester,” he wrote.
This article originally appeared online at browndailyherald.com on Nov. 6, 2025.
Correction: The Oct. 31 edition of The Herald listed the incorrect byline for "Lorenz Hart's downfall is palpabale in 'Blue Moon' despite faltering plot." It was written by Rebecca Goodman. The Herald regrets the error.
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JAKE PARKER / HERALD
At Tuesday’s faculty meeting, Provost Francis Doyle explained that if the University continued to admit doctoral students at a rate consistent with recent years, costs would increase by 7.3%.
COURTESY OF JANET BLUME
Blume's final day at Brown will be June 30, 2026.
ELECTIONS
Jill Davidson ’89 wins Democratic primary for Providence City Council Ward 2
public schools, climate action, housing reform
BY ANNIKA SINGH METRO EDITOR
On Tuesday evening, Jill Davidson ’89 won the four-way Democratic primary for Providence City Council’s Ward 2 seat, which represents the Blackstone, College Hill and Wayland neighborhoods. As of 9:36 p.m. on Tuesday, Davidson secured 49.11% of the total vote, winning all three Ward 2 precincts, according to results posted by the Rhode Island Board of Elections.
She is slated to face current student and Republican candidate Alex Brito ’26 in the Dec. 2 general election, which will fill the seat former City Councilor Helen Anthony vacated in September. Providence has not elected a Republican candidate to City Council in 39 years.
Davidson ran against David Caldwell, Jeff Levy and Matt McDermott for the Democratic nomination. Each candidate spent over $30,000 in the City Council race, the Boston Globe reported.
During a forum held on campus last
month, Davidson stressed the need to reform Providence public schools and expressed support for a City Council ordinance amendment that would strengthen restrictions on Providence Police Depart-
ment cooperation with federal immigration enforcement.
In her campaign, Davidson has also emphasized a commitment to climate action and housing reform. Leading up to
the primary, she was the only Democratic candidate to support rent stabilization. She has been endorsed by Climate Action R.I., Reclaim R.I., Anthony and Rhode Island State Senator Sam Zurier (D-Providence),
among others. Davidson did not endorse Providence Mayor Brett Smiley, who is up for reelection next year.
Davidson is the development and communications director at environmental nonprofit Woonasquatucket River Watershed Council. She has also served on the boards of several nonprofits, including the Jewish Community Center and Temple Emanu-el.
“Community, culture and affordability” brought Davidson’s family to Providence over two decades ago, her website reads. “After two decades of advocacy in Providence, … I’m ready to bring my skills and experience to City Hall.”
In a public statement celebrating the primary win, Davidson discussed her campaign priorities. “Parents want excellent schools for their children. Homeowners are concerned about property taxes, and tenants are worried about rising rents,” she wrote. “Young people wonder if they’ll ever afford to live in their hometown.”
“Whether I earned your vote or not,” she wrote in the statement, “you can count on me to listen.”
This article originally appeared online at browndailyherald.com on Nov. 4, 2025.
RISD launches first new academic department in almost 30 years
Computation, Technology and Culture Department houses new majors
BY CODY CHENG CONTRIBUTING WRITER
For the first time in nearly 30 years, students enrolled at the Rhode Island School of Design have a new academic department to explore.
This fall, RISD launched the Computation, Technology and Culture Department, which houses a new undergraduate degree program in art and computation, as well as
a new program in sound. Beyond the two new majors, the department also hosts the Computation, Technology and Culture undergraduate concentration, or minor, which was first established in 2017.
The CTC department “treats computation as a medium for art and design,” said Department Head Clement Valla, a RISD professor whose work centers on the intersection of humans and computers.
“A bunch of our students might be in media, digital media, communication, digital journalism, online storytelling, those kinds of businesses,” added Valla, who himself studied digital and media when
he was a graduate student at RISD. “It’s a very open and flexible department.”
Students pursuing both majors are required to take one core CTC studio course in every semester between sophomore and senior year, and complete a final degree project before graduation.
Students majoring in art and computation study computational art through a historical, theoretical and methodological lens during their sophomore year, before taking on coding and programming in their junior year. Those studying sound spend their sophomore year practicing programming and spatial audio, later moving into
composing and performing during their junior year.
Ethan Wei, a sophomore at RISD, is part of the first cohort of students majoring in art and computation. Initially hoping to choose a major that aligned with his interests in user interface and experience, Wei was first attracted to RISD’s industrial design program.
But upon learning about the new department, Wei chatted with Valla and felt the vision for the art and computation program better matched what he wanted in his curriculum.
“This is really a department that con-
nects to the modern technology more and the modern world more,” said Wei, who is also a student representative for his major. “I think as technology develops, designers should develop with the technology.”
With rapid advancements in artificial intelligence, the CTC department also plans to explore the ways designers can leverage AI, Valla said.
CTC students engage with AI in many forms not only to “examine it critically, but also to imagine ways in which there would be different futures for AI,” he added.
Nathan Petree ’28, a Brown-RISD Dual Degree student majoring in sound in the CTC department, said it was “really good” to be part of a department that pushes boundaries. He added that the new department “is all about pure experimentation and play.”
Petree is currently taking CTC course SOUND 2002: “Sonic Mapping: Narratives, Soundscapes and Archives,” which explores the role of sound in areas such as storytelling and creative expression. He said the class has expanded his perspective on what is considered sound and music.
“The sound of the birds outside, the trees or the noise in the air can be music too,” Petree said.
He also explained that sound is often interpreted by people with many different backgrounds, which can bring varied perspectives.
“You have people very involved in technology … and then you have people that are psychologists or artists,” Petree said. “Sound is kind of like connecting every one of us.”
Petree was previously majoring in film, animation and video, but “the film major didn’t quite fit for me or align with my interests,” he said. “When I heard about the sound major coming out, I felt like … I would be greatly missing out if I wasn’t a part of that.”
Davidson campaigned on
Jill Davidson ’89, middle, is the development and communications director at environmental nonprofit Woonasquatucket River Watershed Council.
BEN KANG / HERALD
The new department requires that students in both majors enroll in six core CTC studios, taken each semester between sophomore and senior year, and a final degree project.
COURTESY OF FRIENDS OF JILL DAVIDSON
Apple Cinemas opens at Providence Place, replacing Showcase Cinemas
Many students expressed curiosity about the mall’s latest addition
BY GIA SHIN STAFF WRITER
Apple Cinemas officially opened Saturday at Providence Place Mall, taking over the downtown space previously occupied by Showcase Cinemas, which closed its doors on Oct. 26.
The Massachusetts-based theater chain will continue operations during a year-long renovation that includes installing luxury recliners and upgrading the IMAX projection and sound systems. Renovations are
expected to finish by winter 2026, according to WJAR. Apple Cinemas also plans to add a bowling lounge, trampoline park and bar to the space.
The opening comes amid ongoing efforts to revitalize the mall after it entered court-appointed receivership last year.
For many Brown students, the opening marks the return of one of the few multiplexes in close proximity to College Hill.
“I actually have a lot of really good memories going with friends to watch a movie, pretty spontaneously, (on) random Friday, Saturday nights,” Finnur Christianson ’27 said.
He added that he was initially disappointed when Showcase closed but now feels “cautiously optimistic” about the
arrival of Apple Cinemas.
Raymondo Chapa Ponce ’27 shared a similar experience, recalling how he and his friends made frequent trips to the theater for major releases, from Marvel movies to “Five Nights at Freddy’s” and “A Minecraft Movie.”
“This was a chance to go away from school and go watch something fun,” he said.
But Chapa Ponce said he has mixed feelings about the new theater. He hopes Apple Cinemas keeps ticket prices affordable, as tickets at Showcase Cinemas “were already very expensive,” he said.
“If Apple Cinemas is way fancier like Showcase Cinemas, I’m afraid that the tickets are going to be even more expen-
sive,” he said.
Apple Cinemas did not respond to a request for comment.
While Apple Cinemas brings new amenities, some students said those features won’t affect whether they return.
“I don’t honestly care for features like that,” said Isabel Hahn ’26, a member of Ivy Film Festival and a former Herald arts & culture editor. “I think I’d be more interested in what kinds of screens that they’re going to install.”
To Hahn, watching “Dune: Part Two” and “Demon Slayer: Kimetsu No Yaiba The Movie: Infinity Castle” on the IMAX screens was a unique experience. “Providence is kind of a small city, (and) there’s not that many IMAX screens across the
country, so the fact that we have one here was really cool.”
For Hahn, the news that Apple Cinemas would replace Showcase came as a relief after she feared the space might close permanently.
“I love going to watch movies, and I like being on top of watching new films and titles,” she said.
Other students said the additional activities Apple Cinemas plans to offer could make the mall even more appealing to visit.
“With all these activities, I feel like it’s definitely a big draw, especially because in Providence in general, there’s not a ton to do,” Christianson said. “I think everyone’s always looking for something to try out.”
Suit closed after court finds PPSD’s special education complies with federal law
The lawsuit alleged district failed to provide timely special education
BY AVA STRYKER-ROBBINS SENIOR STAFF WRITER
On Wednesday, the Rhode Island Department of Education, the American Civil Liberties Union of Rhode Island and the Rhode Island Center for Justice announced the closure of a federal lawsuit alleging that RIDE and the Providence Public School District failed to provide timely special education services to hundreds of students with disabilities between the ages of three and five.
The ACLU of R.I. and the RICJ filed the suit in July 2023 on behalf of Parents Leading for Educational Equity, a family-centered education advocacy group, and several families impacted by the alleged special education deficits.
In their suit, the plaintiffs claimed that RIDE and the PPSD failed to evaluate children for special education services, did not adequately deliver services outlined in Individual Education Programs and insufficiently transitioned toddlers with disabilities from early intervention programs. Timelines and requirements for many of these services are outlined by the federal Individuals with Disabilities Education Act.
“There’s a very steep learning curve from (age) zero to five in terms of developmental milestones for young children,” said
Jennifer Wood ’81 P’15, executive director of the Rhode Island Center for Justice and an attorney on the case, in an interview with The Herald.
“There’s lots of research and writing out there about the importance of the preschool years, particularly for children with disabilities,” she added.
In a negotiated settlement agreement entered in August 2023, RIDE and the PPSD agreed to streamline evaluation and placement processes and implement plans to expand pre-K enrollment for students with disabilities, among other terms.
The court appointed a third-party monitor to provide monthly reports on the district’s process until the PPSD was found to be in compliance with agreed upon terms. While it initially projected to close the suit by July 2025, the court extended its review to Nov. 1 after the defendants failed to reach outlined milestones.
The suit was closed following the filing of a report by the external monitor last month, which demonstrated that the PPSD reached substantial compliance with the agreement.
“Through court monitoring and monthly reports initiated as part of the 2023 agreement, PPSD has demonstrated clear and significant progress in evaluating and providing services to early childhood special education students,” wrote RIDE Spokesperson Victor Morente in an email to The Herald. “As a result, the lawsuit has been officially closed, affirming PPSD’s
commitment to meeting its obligations and supporting all students.”
Over the past two years, the district worked to restructure the student evaluation process, developed “a data tool to track students from referral to placement” and hired additional staff, Morente wrote. They also increased the number of classrooms “specifically designed to serve differently-abled pre-K students” from 35 in the 2022-23 academic year to 41 this year, he added.
“The successful closure of this lawsuit marks years of dedication from families and
advocates who refused to accept a system that denied young children the services they deserve and are legally entitled to,” said Ramona Santos Torres, co-founder and executive director of PLEE, in a press release.
The termination of the suit “is a tremendous accomplishment,” Wood added.
“It’s been a long, difficult period of gradual improvement, so I think everyone is very excited that there’s demonstrated evidence that those requirements are being met.”
Even with this success, Wood stressed the importance of maintaining this forward
momentum.
“We’re going to continue to monitor and ensure that those requirements are being met and that it doesn’t fall apart or move towards a crisis situation again in the future,” she said.
Ellen Saideman, a cooperating attorney with the ACLU of R.I., also views the result of this case as a massive success. “I hope it means that Providence has learned from this” and “will take proactive measures to ensure … that these kids will get the appropriate services that they need in a timely way,” she added.
The opening comes amid ongoing efforts to revitalize the mall after it entered court-appointed receivership last year.
SELINA KAO / HERALD
BOMI OKIMOTO / HERALD
While the suit was settled in August 2023, the court maintained oversight of the case until the PPSD was found to be in compliance with agreed upon terms.
FOOTBALL
Football outlasted by Penn in 28-21 loss
The Bears have lost three games in a row and are 0-4 in Ivy League play
BY SAJIV MEHTA STAFF WRITER
Despite rallying in the second half, the Brown football team (3-4, 0-4 Ivy) fell 28-21 to Penn (5-2, 3-1) on Halloween. Following an encouraging 3-1 start to the season, the Bears have slid to three consecutive losses and have yet to defeat an Ivy League opponent.
The Quakers put up 21 first-half points, jumping out to an early multiple-possession lead they never relinquished.
“I think we have to look at some ways to start a little faster,” Head Coach James Perry ’00 said in a post-game interview. “There was a stretch of really good football that we played ... but we started the game poorly.”
Although Brown’s first drive started with an explosive play –– receiver Trevor Foley ’28 high-pointed a one-on-one ball for 35 yards on the second play from scrimmage –– movement quickly stalled.
Facing a fourth-and-7 at Penn’s 28-yard line, quarterback James Murphy ’27 forced the ball into tight coverage.
Penn defensive back Jayden Drayton tipped the ball into the air. His teammate, Josh Narcisse, snatched it and found a running lane, returning the ball for 30 yards.
The Quakers capitalized on the mistake, strategically plodding downfield with a stack of short gains. A low bullet by Penn quarterback Liam O’Brien sent his offense to the 1-yard line, where tailback Donte West took a run up the gut to create a 7-0 Penn lead.
The Bears did not let that slide. In just five plays, the offense moved to Penn’s 44-yard line, where the receiving corps put their stamp on the drive. Securing Murphy’s
and once Woodhall began using prosthetics, he said he was “just like any other kid.”
“I learned to walk — I’d walk, fall down, get up and keep going,” he said. “It’s everything I knew.”
Now, Woodhall wants to use his platform to open more conversations about what it means to live with a disability.
“My number one goal is to get people to be comfortable with having a conversation about disability, about sport,” he said.
Woodhall also revealed that, in partnership with Deloitte, McLaren and Disney, he is embarking on a project to build “the best possible prosthetic legs that have ever been
toss on a short crossing route, Ty Pezza ’26 cruised toward the goal line, running along the left hash. A firm red-zone block by Foley ensured Pezza remained untouched en route to tying up the match.
Continuing Penn’s attack, O’Brien conducted another strong performance. In 10 plays, the Quakers moved 70 yards downfield and across the goal line. A 21yard rush by O’Brien propelled Penn to Bruno’s 9-yard line, and on the very next play, the Quakers scored on a completion to Bisi Owens.
After a quick response to Penn’s first touchdown, the Bears stalled on offense after the second. Creating only 1 first down, Brown faced a third-and-8 on their own 36-yard line. Rolling right, Murphy was chased by Quaker defenders and was forced to throw the ball away. A punt followed, sending the ball back to Penn.
Once more, a deftly designed charge put the Quakers into the end zone. After gradual movement to their own 48-yard line, Penn ramped up the intensity. O’Brien completed a 19-yard pass –– then a 24-yarder –– then an 8-yard checkdown to the 1-yard line. From there, running back Sean
made. And we’re going to try to break the able-bodied world record in the 400-meter.”
“I want to change the perception of what it means to have disability, what it means to be different and show that the thing that makes you different might be the one thing that allows you to change the world,” Woodhall said.
As one of the defining athletes of her generation, Davis-Woodhall touched on the current climate surrounding women’s sports. “There’s so many areas that need to be improved, but I can say that it’s working,” Davis-Woodhall began.
“I see women’s sports as big as men’s sports,” she added. “It’s just going to take
Williams Jr. leapt through a gap between Bruno’s defensive line, giving the Quakers a 21-7 advantage.
Suddenly facing a two-score uphill climb, Bruno’s offense was revived. Moving the sticks in two plays or less, Murphy completed each of his 5 pass attempts throughout the drive, taking the Bears to Penn’s 24-yard line. On a third-and-5, Brown turned to the passing game once more.
Murphy put up a one-on-one ball for Solomon Miller ’26, who head tapped his defender en route to the end zone. For a breathtaking moment, Brown had sliced the lead in half. But then an offensive pass interference penalty dashed Bruno’s hopes, leading to yet another punt.
Penn’s drive to close out the half went 65 yards but the Quakers ultimately came up short after missing a 51-yard field goal and headed into halftime with a 14-point lead.
Coming out of the locker room, Bruno showed increased energy. After the Quakers managed to move the ball to Brown’s 32yard line, the Bears’ defense took a stand. Ivy League sack leader Ike Odimegwu ’27
a bit of time to get there, but I think it’s going to do it for sure.”
Addressing the student-athletes in the auditorium, Davis-Woodhall shared some of the advice she gives her athletes as assistant track and field coach at Kansas State University.
“Just to enjoy the moment,” she said. “You’re not goi ng to make the right decision every single time.”
Echoing her point, Woodhall explained that in the couple’s house, they have a saying: “You either win or you learn.”
“The hardest thing you’re ever going to go through in life, the hardest thing that you ever have to deal with in life is
got to O’Brien on second down, and on third down, the defensive front kept up the pressure.
Owen Clarke ’26 blew through a hole in the offensive line and in a last-ditch attempt to escape a sack, O’Brien released a wayward pass. The ball drifted just above the head of running back Tommy Lafayette and into the waiting hands of Bruno linebacker John Perdue ’26.
Wasting no time, the Bears’ offense capitalized on the sudden turnover. Their second snap resulted in a 16-yard reception at the left sideline for Miller. Just a few plays later, on a third-and-15, tight end Levi Linowes ’27 found a seam, received the ball in-stride and held off a Penn defender to reach the Quakers’ 8-yard line.
On fourth down, after Penn stopped three consecutive goal-to-go attempts, Bruno unveiled some Halloween trickery. Before the snap, receiver Najih Rahman ’27 went in motion from the slot position. After passing in front of Murphy, he circled into the backfield, running a swing route to the right. Catching Murphy’s pitch, Rahman feigned a run before tossing a touchdown pass to Pearson Hill ’28.
Reflecting on Brown’s second-half start, Perry said, “I’m really proud of the guys, how we came out in the second half, how they worked, how they stuck together.”
But Penn had no intention of allowing Bruno to close the gap. On their first series, the Quakers caught the Bears off-guard on a third-down run and Williams broke free, dashing 40 yards to the 1-yard line. Another rushing touchdown pushed Penn’s lead to 28-14.
On the subsequent kickoff, a flag for an invalid fair catch signal set the Bears back to their own 11-yard line. Undeterred, Murphy began his offense’s journey downfield. Aided by consecutive quick strikes to Pezza, a 15-yard roughing the passer penalty and a 25-yard toss to Foley, the
going to be the best lesson you’ve ever learned,” he said. “It’s going to be the thing that allows you to go farther and do the next thing. You really win or you learn, and those opportunities where you don’t win, you learn a very important lesson.”
“Look at failure with a positive light,” he added.
Chambers then directed the conversation to the Woodhalls shared YouTube channel, which has almost one million subscribers.
“We share a lot online, but we also keep a lot in-house,” Davis-Woodhall said.
“We are athletes, but at the end of the day, we are humans, and we’re just like you guys — we’re just like anyone out there.”
“Look at failure with a positive light. It’s going to happen," Hunter Woodhall said. "You’re going to fail, you’re going to mess up, you’re going to make mistakes. See how you can learn from them and get better, and that’s what’s going to lead you to whatever it is you want to do in life.”
Other than relatability, the Woodhalls make a point of being vulnerable.
Woodhall explained that they intentionally show online “how messed up and flawed we are as humans, how imperfect we are and how we have bad days.”
“It hopefully shows that the things that make us unique, the things that make us different and perfect are the things that have allowed us to change the world, inspire people and chase our own dreams,” he added. “At some point you’ll learn it’s not a burden, it’s a blessing, and it’s going to allow you to make the world a better place.”
Bears reached Penn’s red zone. But there, the Quakers’ defensive front stood tall, forcing a fourth-and-10.
Drew Crabtree ’29 took the field for a 28-yard field goal attempt, but his kick sailed wide left, taking Bruno’s momentum with it.
The next 3 drives resulted in punts –– 2 for Penn and 1 for Brown –– taking valuable time off the game clock. When the Bears’ offense emerged for another drive, only 8 minutes remained.
Following a second-down sack, on third-and-19, Foley created the contest’s premier play. Pinned against the right sideline and facing a high-arcing ball, Foley extended his right arm into the night sky while falling backwards, corralling the ball with just one palm. The play was later named SportsCenter’s top highlight of the day.
Energized by the miraculous grab, Brown eagerly bounded downfield toward the goal line. From Penn’s 14-yard line, Murphy delivered to Foley, who fought off Quaker defenders and lunged onto the navy turf of the end zone. Suddenly, the Bears were only one score behind and poised to endanger Penn’s once-assured victory.
But for a final time, the Quakers’ offense drove convincingly. Winding down the clock, Penn collected first down after first down, eventually progressing all the way to Brown’s 1-yard line before kneeling out for a victory.
“It’s really easy to be motivated,” Murphy reflected in a post-game interview. “We have three more opportunities to go play football and put it all on the line for the seniors.”
The Bears will be back in action when they host Yale (5-2, 3-1) on Saturday. Kickoff is slated for noon.
This article originally appeared online at browndailyherald.com on Nov. 2, 2025.
Speaking about their relationship, Davis-Woodhall said “we’re best friends.”
The 2024 Olympics was “one of the most humbling moments of my life,” Woodhall confessed in turn. “Tara won the Olympic gold medal, the biggest dream of her entire life,” but rather than bask in the attention, she didn’t talk to the media until after Woodhall competed in the Paralympic Games.
“She’s the most incredible, humble person in the world,” he concluded. “If you’re a fan of her — for whatever reason that you’re a fan of her — you are a fan of the exact person you think you are.”
After the first half hour, Chambers opened the session to questions from audience members. In response to a question about how they reset after the Olympics, Davis-Woodhall said that “we don’t think about a track for a really long time.”
“We give ourselves a big break — longer than six weeks — because we want to miss the track,” she added. “We want to be able to have a rebound love after the Olympics.”
Attendee Nina Kruzewska ’27, a member of the women’s track and field team, said the event encouraged her “to pursue her dreams and go for it.”
Aaron Caveney ’27, a distance runner on the track team, said he thought it was “inspiring to hear such successful people talk about how they were able to get it done, even when life throws curveballs.”
COURTESY OF MICHAEL NANCE VIA BROWN ATHLETICS
Running Back Matt Childs ’28 rushes the ball during Friday’s loss to Penn.
LECTURE FROM PAGE 1
HORATIO HAMILTON / HERALD Tara Davis-Woodhall and Hunter Woodhall touched on their athletic success, navigating relationships and overcoming adversity in a 60-minute conversation hosted by Brown Lecture Board on Monday.
SOCCER
With 1-2 loss, women’s soccer barely qualifies for Ivy tournament
This Thursday, the Bears will take on Princeton again in the semifinals
BY ABIGAIL DONOVAN SENIOR STAFF WRITER
Heading into this Saturday’s home matchup against Princeton (7-5-3, 5-2-0 Ivy), women’s soccer (9-3-4, 3-2-2) had a chance to secure the Ivy League regular season title. But after losing to the Tigers 1-2, the Bears fell to fourth in the conference — just barely qualifying for the Ivy League Tournament set to take place later this week.
Despite dropping their senior day matchup, Bruno will soon have a shot at redemption: On Thursday, the Bears will take on the Tigers again in the Ivy tournament semifinals.
“It was a tough result to swallow today,” Head Coach Kia McNeill said in a post-match interview with Brown Athletics. “I really feel for the team because we didn’t get the result we wanted, even though the effort was there.”
Saturday’s game got off to a slow start, with neither team managing to shoot in the first 20 minutes. Although Princeton was first to threaten the goal with a shot in the 21st minute, team captain Naya Cardoza ’26 was there for the block.
From there, the Tigers kept up the
pressure. In the 29th minute, a long free kick pushed the ball toward Brown’s goal. Catching Bruno’s defense off guard, Princeton’s Alexandra Barry fired a missile from outside the box to score the first goal of the day.
But the Bears weren’t discouraged by the 0-1 deficit. Just 30 seconds later, Joy Okonye ’27 tallied Brown’s first shot of the match. From outside the left corner of the box, she sent the ball to the top right corner of the goal, just barely missing wide.
Maintaining pressure, Brown tallied 2 more shots over the next 7 minutes. Unfortunately, Bruno struggled to make good from the attempts: One was aimed too high, and the other was blocked by defenders.
But it didn’t take long for the Bears to find another opportunity to score: On a corner kick, Brooke Birtwistle ’28 sent the ball closer to the Princeton goal, leaving the two teams grappling for possession.
Audrey Lam ’27 was the first to rein the ball in, sending it past Princeton’s defensive line into the 6-yard box.
Cardoza kept the ball away from Princeton’s goalkeeper with another header, placing the ball inside the goal area with no one to defend it. Seizing the opportunity, Claire Silverman ’27 placed the ball low into the center of the net, bringing the score to 1-all.
The score marked Silverman’s first
career goal with the Bears. But she credited her teammates with the assists, calling it a “good team goal.”
“It felt awesome to score my first goal,” Silverman said in a post-game interview with The Herald. “It’s really rewarding to show up for the team every day and then do something like that.”
Following Silverman’s goal, neither team was able to pull ahead, and the game remained tied going into the break.
“I thought we responded well after going down 1-0,” McNeill said. “Getting the equalizer before halftime showed our character.”
When play resumed in the second half, the Bears pounced first. Crowded by three defenders, Ayla Sahin ’28 sent
the ball low toward the center of the goal. But Princeton’s goalie made the save, sustaining the tied game.
Three minutes later, the Tigers converted where the Bears couldn’t. Princeton’s Dylan Jovanovic sent a long kick from the right sideline past Brown’s defense. Reacting quickly, Jovanovic’s teammate Alexandra Barry headed the ball past Brown goalie Addison Etter ’29 to push Princeton’s advantage to 2-1.
But once again, Brown launched an offensive in hopes of evening the score.
With just 7 minutes left in the game, Birtwistle sent a corner kick into the box, where a Cardoza header sent the ball over defenders and toward the top left of the goal. But to the Bears’ dismay, it sailed
out just wide of the left post.
Two minutes later, Okonye raced the ball down the left flank and made a pinpoint pass to Sahin, who then shot the ball past the diving Princeton goalie. Yet again, the Bears fell short: The ball curved just outside the right post, and Bruno was no closer to tying the game.
In the final minutes, Princeton ran down the clock and handed Bruno the disappointing loss. With the win, the Tigers’ Ivy record improved to 5-2, securing them the Ivy League title.
“We came out strong to start the second half and were on the front foot, but Princeton scored against the run of play, and that took some of the wind out of our sails,” McNeill said. “Even so, we kept pushing and created chances late, but the ball just didn’t bounce our way today.”
Now, the Bears will have to turn the page and prepare for the Ivy tournament. Less than a week after Saturday’s matchup, they will face the Tigers again at 7 p.m. on Thursday in New Jersey.
According to Silverman, the team hopes “to reset after an unfortunate loss and focus on the next game.”
“It’ll be good for us to regroup and go at it again against them,” McNeill said.
This article originally appeared online at browndailyherald.com on Nov. 4, 2025.
Men’s soccer defeats Columbia 1-0 as Ivy tournament looms
Brown in fourth place in the Ivy League, one regular-season match left
BY MILES MONROE SENIOR STAFF WRITER
Saturday evening, the men’s soccer team
(6-6-2, 2-3-1 Ivy) sailed to a 1-0 victory over Columbia (3-7-4, 1-4-1) in front of a packed Senior Day crowd. Following the win, the Bears sit at fourth place in the conference with just one match remaining to secure a spot in the Ivy League Tournament.
After a heartbreaking 2-1 loss to Cornell last week, the Bears entered Saturday’s match looking to break a three-game losing streak and keep their postseason hopes afloat. On the other side of the field, Columbia came in hot off the heels of a 5-1 victory over Fordham (8-5-3, 5-1-2 Atlantic 10) and a 3-1 win over Harvard (5-5-5, 1-3-2).
But whatever momentum the Lions may have felt coming into the match was thwarted immediately. In the game’s opening minutes, Brown dominated on both ends of the field.
“I don’t think it was pretty. Ivy League games are tough, but I’m really proud of our team,” Head Coach Chase Wileman told Brown Athletics after the game.
“It’s been a long month,” Wileman added, “and just the resilience that we showed, with the fight and spirit, tells you a lot about the group.”
In the 16th minute, the Bears propelled themselves onto the scoreboard. Mads Stistrup Petersen ’26, a 2024 Second Team All-Ivy midfielder, arced a corner kick into the box. Columbia’s goalkeeper punched the ball away, but Brown’s Greyson Mitchell ’26 stood in its way and sent a header back into the six-yard box. Facing away
from the goal, Stefano D’Agostini ’28 secured the ball and miraculously windmilled, sending a powerful volley into the back of the net to mark his first goal of the season.
Just like that, Columbia was trying to crawl back into a game that had barely started. But Brown did not let up. The Bears’ offense — spearheaded by 2024 First Team All-Ivy forward Lorenzo Amaral ’27 — continued to relentlessly hammer the Lions’ defense.
In an email to The Herald, Amaral wrote that his success this season could not have come “without the commitment of (his) teammates and coaches.”
“At the end of the day, I want the team to be successful and (to) continue to push myself so we can reach our objectives for this season,” he added.
In the 29th minute, Amaral found him-
self isolated on the right wing. Burning his defender to the middle of the field, he sent a beautiful cross to D’Agostini, but the shot was called offside.
Brown maintained their stronghold for the rest of the half, outshooting the Lions 6-2. But other than D’Agostini’s early netting, neither team put a single shot on goal, and the score remained 1-0 at halftime.
Bruno came back from the break blazing. Less than 2 minutes into the second half, Mateo Pereyra ’29 — Brown’s leading goal-scorer — sent a beautiful through ball into the box to an open Jamin Gogo Peters ’26, who narrowly missed the top right corner of the goal.
Despite trailing on the scoreboard, Columbia fired back with a flurry of chances, with 10 of their 12 total shots coming in the second half. During one
close encounter in the box in the 60th minute, a dangerous Columbia cross led to a narrow miss.
Although the Lions had several opportunities to score, none of them came to fruition — mainly due to the strong Bruno backline anchored by goalie Henrik Weiper ’26.
There is “nothing better than an evening with a clean sheet,” Weiper told Brown Athletics after the game. “A lot of credit goes to my defense line, and the whole team in general.”
Play remained relatively equal until, over 70 minutes in, an illegal slide tackle in the box gave Brown a penalty kick and a chance to put the nail in the coffin. Peters stepped up to take the kick, but his powerful shot bounced off the post, and the score remained 1-0.
As the final minutes ticked down and
the prospect of defeat became more tangible, Columbia put more pressure on the Bears. But a save by Weiper — marking his third of the night — kept the Lions scoreless. When the final whistle blew, the Bears rode the 1-0 victory into the night.
“Our team was focused on the goal of getting a result, and I’m happy we were able to come out with it,” Amaral wrote.
The team looks to secure a spot in the Ivy tournament with a win over Yale (2-9-3, 1-4-1) this Saturday in New Haven.
“The team knows what’s on the line,” Amaral wrote. “We know it’s a game we have to win in order to make it to the playoffs, so now it’s full concentration on the gameplay and mental preparation.”
This article originally appeared online at browndailyherald.com on Nov. 5, 2025.
VANSON VU / HERALD
Saturday’s game got off to a slow start, with neither team managing to shoot in the first 20 minutes.
MAX ROBINSON / HERALD In the game’s opening minutes, Brown dominated on both ends of the field.
Dear Readers,
Halloween is over, but the trees have begun shedding their leaves to reveal eerie skeleton bodies. I once wrote an article for post- about struggling to enjoy other seasons just as much as autumn. It has to do with my love of being cozy, of being indoors, of spooky things, and—perhaps in largest part—of the colors on the trees. Even though I know they’re the same leaves, just reduced in chlorophyll, their transformed and multicolored versions always feel like special visitors. While they’re here, all manner of magical things can happen. So, it’s always hard to see them fall, and the satisfying crunch of them beneath my feet is bittersweet. They’re certainly not gone yet, but each day I feel myself taking inventory.
And yet, as I find every year, life doesn’t halt when the trees are bare. Pivotal moments and memories take place in winter, spring, and summer—some of them even wonderful. I can’t reverse-hibernate through the warm months to save my waking hours for my favorite season, and despite my current mourning, I know I wouldn’t want to. Each has its unique charms, and each is necessary. Counterintuitively, this realization helps me savor autumn all the more. Acceptance of what’s to come, knowing I’ll be okay no matter the season: This is how I let go of the urge to count the remaining leaves.
This week, our writers are also figuring how to be amidst change. In Feature, Dolma grows a personal historical archive,
and Sasha confronts ambivalence about one messenger of the world’s present moment: The New York Times. In Narrative, making pasta for loved ones is a constant for Ana, and it takes an adrenaline-racing experience for AnnaLise to accept the birthdays to come. In Arts and Culture, Ann celebrates the link from past to present that is Minecraft, and, on a roll this week, Sasha links poetic legends Poe and Pitbull. In Lifestyle, Elaine adjusts to life not spent in constant dancing motion, and Sara dissects just a couple of moments from one morning. In addition, we have a crossword from Alayna full of friends from the farm, and in this week’s post-pourri, we have a comic strip from Selena where we encounter a few new pals!
It’s my last semester here at Brown. As I graduate in December, the end of autumn seems laden with greater significance this year. After this, the coming seasons are among the only things I know to expect. Even if the inevitable coatings of snow, spring allergies, and summer heat are not always preferred, they are at least familiar. All I can do is cling to their comforts as I proceed into the great unknowns of the future. That and, of course, read post-; I hope that you will do the same!
“I do not dream of labor…Good night.”
“I just realized last night that plastic surgery doesn’t involve plastic.”
1. Lyin’
THINGS THE LION DOESN’T CONCERN HIMSELF WITH
2. Slack notifications
3. Lactose intolerance
4. Eerie similarities between his life and the plot of Hamlet
5. The witch and the wardrobe
6. Tigers and bears, oh my!
7. Anything the light does not touch
8. Being turned into a rug
9. Sleeping tonight
10. What you’ve done, but what you do with what you’ve done for others
on the farm
by alayna chen illustrated by Wanxin Li
“The fresh cold made us gasp until our blood and the steady air reminded us we were warm. Plumes of mud flowered from the river’s floor where the current tripped a rolling stone or the crawfish pranced or we shuffled and kicked. Our arms gestured high and droplets flew around us like crystal flies.”
— Nina Lidar, “about fire”
Lesa Jae 5 9
1. Original "Harvest Moon" platform, for short
5. Assists
7. Letters in a nursery rhyme
8. Urged someone on
9. Science dept.
“We walk along the lake’s circumference and its green is something I want to inject into my hippocampus and remember, too. I reach for your hand hesitantly, as I am still afraid of being too forward, even after more than a year of knowing your calluses.”
— Ellyse Givens, “send my love” 11.2.23
EDITOR-IN-CHIEF
1. "Baa" animal
2. Horse sound
3. Lamenting poem
4. James Bond and others
6. Grass seed alternative
Section Editors Chelsea Long Maxwell Zhang
LIFESTYLE Managing Editor
Daniella Coyle
Section Editors Hallel Abrams Gerber
Nahye Lee
POST-POURRI Managing Editor Michelle Bi
Section Editor Tarini Malhotra
HEAD ILLUSTRATORS
Junyue Ma
Jessica Lee
Copy Editors Indigo Mudbhary Lindsey Nguyen
LAYOUT CHIEF
Amber Zhao
Layout Designers Emma Scneider Emma Vachal
James Farrington
Tiffany Tsan
SOCIAL MEDIA
Rebecca Sanchez
Yana Giannoutsos
Yeonjai Song
OPINIONS
Gupta ’25 MD’29: More than ‘just friends’
Love can stretch and reshape itself to fit new boundaries without necessarily breaking. It bends to circumstance, to timing, to what two people can offer each other. “ “
College friendships are supposed to be easy, but they don’t always stay that way. There’s no situation as awkward and nerve-racking as when you start to wonder if you like your friend as more than just a friend.
There’s not necessarily one moment when you realize it. It’s often a slow shift. You start crafting texts more carefully, mentally replaying small moments and feeling flutters that shouldn’t be there. “I just love hanging out with you” starts feeling more like a confession than a compliment.
College makes this kind of confusion practically inevitable. We live, study and eat in the same 10-block radius, surrounded by people who feel closer to us than family. We share dorm rooms, toothpaste, therapy updates, playlists and secrets. We will casually say “love you” to our friends and even flirt without realizing it. The same intimacy that makes college friendships so meaningful can also make them so messy.
The line between platonic and romantic feels incredibly blurry. And so, naturally, it nags at you. You want to know if you should say something, if this is one of those “life’s too short” moments that people online always encourage strangers to act on. But choosing the bold move can feel like detonating a bomb, jeopardizing your entire friendship and risking the organic dynamic that you love, even if the feelings are reciprocated. Most of all, you risk rejection and possible humiliation.
And yet, saying nothing doesn’t feel safe either. You end up performing friendship: casual smiles, careful hugs, yet your heart pounds at every accidental brush of the knee. You’re fine with “just friends,” but your stomach drops every time they mention someone new in their life.
So, what should you do?
The first myth to dismantle is that friendship is the lesser form of love. Romantic relationships are treated as the pinnacle of intimacy, but think about it: Your closest friendships have probably lasted longer than most people’s relationships. Your friends have seen you at your lowest, ugliest and most unflattering moments. They’ve witnessed you cry on the kitchen floor, stood in line with you at the dining hall for the fifth time in the same week and still answered your FaceTime at midnight. That’s not second-best love: That’s the foundation of what it’s like to love and be loved back.
Sometimes when we crush on a friend, what we’re really developing is a deeper appreciation for someone’s closeness and mistaking that warmth for romantic potential. That’s the complexity of human connection — how affection, gratitude and desire can overlap until it’s hard to tell them apart. It’s worth pausing to untangle what kind of love you’re actually feeling before you act on it. Before you confess, ask yourself: Do I actually want to date them? Or do I just want to be loved by someone who already knows me so well?
If it’s the second one, maybe the answer isn’t a confession. Maybe it’s gratitude. Maybe it’s saying, “You mean a lot to me,” and letting that be enough.
But let’s say you’ve decided: This is real. You’ve tried to ignore it, suppress it, joke it away and it’s not working. In that case, honesty is kinder than emotional gymnastics. You don’t have to write a love letter or perform a grand gesture. A simple, “I’ve been feeling something more than friendship, and I just wanted to tell you,” is more than enough.
The key is to speak without expectation. You’re offering information, not an ultimatum. “This is how I feel,” instead of “Please feel it back.” College relationships — romantic or otherwise — work best when they’re built on mutual respect for uncertainty. People are still figuring out who they are, meaning feelings won’t always align. That has to be okay.
If they don’t feel the same way, it will sting. You’ll have to sit with that weird ache when you see them around. But the truth is, most friendships survive that awkwardness. It just takes time and honesty to adjust to new boundaries. If the friendship is real, it will adapt.
Liking a friend doesn’t need to ruin your friendship. Sometimes it changes the relationship, some-
times it deepens it and sometimes it fades. But it always teaches you something about the elasticity of love. Love can stretch and reshape itself to fit new boundaries without necessarily breaking. It bends to circumstance, to timing, to what two people can offer each other. Sometimes it softens into friendship, sometimes it sharpens into longing, sometimes it simply settles into quiet admiration. Try to focus on what it feels like to love someone, regardless of whether it is platonic or romantic, and to appreciate the courage it takes to name that love, even if it’s unreciprocated.
So yes, liking your friend is messy. But so is growing up. So is love. If you’re wondering whether to tell them, maybe you already know the answer. The hardest part isn’t saying it — it’s letting yourself recognize it.
If you have questions about sex or relationships that could be discussed in a future column, please submit questions to an anonymous form at https://tinyurl.com/ BDHsexcolumn. Anusha Gupta ’25 MD’29 can be reached at anusha_gupta@brown.edu. Please send responses to this opinion to letters@browndailyherald.com and other op-eds to opinions@browndailyherald.com.
Yeung ’29: Food for Thought: Frank & Laurie’s
Nestled less than a mile north of Brown’s campus, Frank & Laurie’s serves a delicious brunch on the corner of Camp Street and Doyle Avenue. The restaurant calls itself a “neighborhood affair,” an apt nickname for this homey eatery bustling with locals.
On Sunday, the New England weather gods smiled upon me and my friends as we trekked up Hope Street. Orange leaves floated down through the cool air. Upon entering the Frank & Laurie’s dining room, our hungry trio walked up to a wooden table large enough to seat 15. For warmer days, the restaurant also offers outdoor seating. Inside, wooden shelves were scattered across the space, organically decorated with wine bottles, wildflowers and cutlery. The warm sunlight peeking through the windows added a warm glow to
this picture-perfect scene. I was transported to a cottage in the English countryside, but my mind snapped back to reality when our food arrived.
Up first was the biscuit with homemade peach jam and whipped butter ($7). It was a sight to behold, glorious in all its golden hues. And it tasted even better than it looked. The biscuit was extraordinarily crispy, inviting me to break it apart by hand and feel its fluffy interior — still warm, of course. With a good portion of the jam and butter, it was truly a perfect bite. The slight acidity from the baking soda cut through the richness of the spreads. I would honestly walk the 20 minutes from my dorm just for the biscuit alone.
Then came our sandwiches — a patty melt ($17) and a croque madame ($19). The patty melt was two thick slices of evenly toasted white bread
I wish I could’ve stayed to lounge around and stare at the gorgeous deep blue ceiling, but alas, economics homework doesn’t do itself.
packed with a thick, juicy beef patty, beer cheese — melted sharp cheddar — and roasted cabbage tossed in a vinaigrette. The crunch from the first bite was heavenly. The croque madame, on the other hand, was dressed up head to toe in melted gruyere, accompanied by a fluffy souffle egg.
Paired with a tender roasted pork shoulder, it was a simple sandwich elevated to its highest potential, all while being relatively unpretentious — no truffle or caviar was harmed in the making of this croque madame.
We ended the meal off with a special — a lamb belly and sausage stew ($20) with potatoes, carrots and kale all soaked in a warm consomme. It was surprisingly light compared to the rest of our meal, with a subtle sweetness from the carrots and a peppery taste from the lamb. While not as standout as the rest of the dishes, it was a welcome finale to an already delightful meal.
This was supposed to be a short brunch before a Sunday lock-in session, but unfortunately, Frank & Laurie’s is a food coma-inducing experience. I lost all motivation to do work, and contin -
ued basking in the restaurant’s soft indie pop. I wish I could’ve stayed to lounge around and stare at the gorgeous deep blue ceiling, but alas, economics homework doesn’t do itself. That’s all to say: If you make the trek to Frank & Laurie’s, come hungry and clear your schedule. I will definitely be back for more.
Service: Warm, casual
Sound level: Conversational
Recommended dishes: Biscuit, ask for their specials
Hours: Wednesday through Sunday 10 a.m. to 3 p.m., Friday 5 p.m. to 9:30 p.m.
Price Range: Appetizers $6-12, Entrees $15-26. Wheelchair accessibility: Accessible entrance 3/5
Christian Yeung ’29 can be reached at christian_yeung@ brown.edu. Please send responses to this column to letters@browndailyherald.com and other opinions to opinions@browndailyherald.com.
GINA BAE / HERALD
KENDRA EASTEP / HERALD
Mooney ’29: Why doing less can help us accomplish more
Picture a person who seems to embody productivity. Maybe you thought of someone cooking dinner while on the phone, answering emails while walking on the treadmill or doing math homework and listening in on a Zoom meeting at the same time. We view this kind of multitasking as the ultimate efficiency because we live in a culture that glorifies busyness — where our worth is often measured by how much we can get done in a day. We equate constant motion with success, even when it leaves us drained and unfocused.
Being at an Ivy League institution only compounds this stress. Surrounded by multifaceted and successful students who seem to perfectly juggle coursework, extracurricular activities and a social life, it feels like we must do the same to keep up. Even though Brown might not be considered a pressure
cooker in the same way similarly ranked universities are, the pressure is there nonetheless. Faced with far more tasks than we can complete in a single day, we may rush to find shortcuts and work on assignments simultaneously, sacrificing quality in the process.
In a culture obsessed with productivity and doing it all, students would benefit more from slowing down and dedicating themselves fully to a few meaningful commitments rather than spreading themselves thin.
As an incoming first-year student, I faced a barrage of advice coming from parents, teachers and third- and fourth-year students at Brown: “Get involved in everything you can,” “join every club,” “say yes to every social event or invitation.” This advice, though well-intentioned, incentivizes the pursuit of quantity over quality, promoting a greater number of commitments instead of a few, meaningful ones.
Much of this pressure may stem from “hustle culture.” This is exacerbated by social media, where influencers post unrealistic “day-in-the-life” videos that show them waking up early, often at 4 a.m., enduring extensive exercise routines and working long hours. The promotion of this mindset starts young — even in children’s books like Harry Potter, Hermione Granger uses a “Time Turner” to go back in time every day and attend twice as many classes as she would otherwise. These cultural tailwinds exacerbate students’ fears — whether about the increasingly uncertain job market, gaining acceptance into competitive graduate programs or withstanding pressures from family members — that the only way to be successful is to do as much as you can. We spread ourselves thin, trying to find internships, do well in our classes or pull all-nighters studying, all to our detriment. Perhaps more importantly, trying to do everything makes us less interested and passionate about what we’re involved in.
While Hermione Granger’s Time Turner is an obviously unrealistic example, the pressure to do more manifests itself in many facets of life on College Hill.
One such example of this is the rise in the number of students double-concentrating, from just under 20% in 2015 to 32% in 2024. According to The Herald’s 2025 First-Year Poll, over 40% of first-year students said they intend to double-concentrate, which often means taking over 20 required classes. Concentrating in two separate fields is widely praised, and it should be — it’s important for students to be well-rounded and have interests that span multiple disciplines. But double-concentrating has pitfalls. It means that the vast majority of classes are predetermined, a principle that is antithetical to the logic behind the Open Curriculum, which en-
ables students to explore different interests without the pressure of fulfilling core requirements. In limiting students to two concentrations, Brown has already recognized the downsides of students pursuing too many areas of interest.
It’s likely the majority of students seeking to double-concentrate are truly interested in both areas. And even if they are not, I can certainly understand why many students are trying to hedge their bets. The job market awaiting college graduates looks more uncertain than ever, so it makes sense that students want to pad their resumes with the most expansive list of experiences possible. But perhaps employers might value someone exhibiting a depth of focus and expertise on one thing, rather than dabbling in everything. Still, evidence points to the conclusion that students who double major do not fare significantly better in the job market than those who only graduate with one degree.
We should instead focus our activities and academics in a few, substantive areas. The benefits of doing one thing at a time, or “single tasking,” are numerous — greater efficiency and fewer mistakes.
As students at Brown, all of us have already proven that we are capable of doing many different things. Now we must prove something that is arguably harder: that we can do a few things well. In the face of hustle culture, the answer is not to try to cram more into our already overpacked lives, but rather to do less while caring about each thing more.
Max Mooney ’29 can be reached at max_mooney@brown. edu. Please send responses to this column to letters@ browndailyherald.com and other opinions to opinions@ browndailyherald.com.
Canfield ’28: 130 years after Brown’s first Jewish students graduated, Jewish life on College Hill is thriving
As one of the first two Jews to graduate from Brown, Israel Strauss, class of 1894, was told by then-University President Elisha Andrews, class of 1870, to pursue different career paths because of his religion. Such comments were not unique in the long history of Jews in the diaspora. It would be hard to imagine that Strauss, in this Christian-centric University community, did not experience significant social isolation while receiving his education, but Jewish students at Brown are no longer pushed to the periphery. One hundred and thirty years later, Jewish life at Brown is thriving.
While other universities, especially in the Ivy League, have seen decreases in Jewish student enrollment over the past decade, Brown has seen a steady increase in the number of young Jews choosing to spend their formative years on College Hill. In 2015, 15% of Brown undergraduates were Jewish. Almost a decade later, that number has risen to 24%. Today, Brown has the highest percentage of Jewish students of any Ivy League university and has the 10th most Jewish students at any private university in America.
This increase is the result of the Brown community’s efforts to create a supportive environment for Jewish students. Impressive renovations at Brown-RISD Hillel and Chabad of College Hill
have provided more space for Brown’s growing Jewish population. In 2017, the University expanded the Providence Eruv, a symbolic enclosure that eases restrictions for observant Jews on the Sabbath. Six years later, it built a kosher meat and dairy kitchen in the Sharpe Refectory. Beyond providing observant Jewish students with the food that meets their religious needs, the kosher kitchen also allows them to eat with the rest of their peers and provides non-Jewish students with a taste of Jewish culture.
As a result of these efforts, Brown has fostered an environment where Jews do not have to choose between their faith and their social life.
Brown’s Jewish students now have the option to attend an Orthodox prayer service every morning and can choose from four different styles of services on Shabbat and other holidays. For many Jews, prayer is the heart of their connection to their faith, and these services provide opportunities to strengthen this foundation. There’s something special about students singing niguns next to their friends, professors and, on occasion, their University president. Jewish learning, both religious and academic, is abundant on College Hill. One pillar of Judaism — and perhaps my favorite — is “Machloket l’Shem Shamayim,” or argument for the sake of heaven. Judaism encourages respectful debate while learning
The University has created initiatives aimed at promoting inclusive and respectful dialogue and provided opportunities for students to share their thoughts on Brown’s investment practices last year.
in order to reach a deeper understanding of the material. Brown’s course offerings and academic programs epitomize this principle. The Program in Judaic Studies offers several classes for students to explore Jewish history, theology and Hebrew. Outside of traditional classes, students can also meet weekly to study Jewish texts at Mishmar and other informal events. In these spaces, Brunonians passionately debate life’s central questions through a Jewish lens.
And, as instances of antisemitism become more frequent worldwide, Brown remains steadfast in its commitment to supporting all of its students, regardless of religion. Amid the past two years of war in the Middle East, Jews have been chased in Amsterdam, gunned down in Washington and harassed on college campuses. While no university has been perfect in its response to campus tensions, Brown has made efforts to ensure its Jewish students feel welcome on campus. The University has created initiatives aimed at promoting inclusive and respectful dialogue and provided opportunities for students to share their thoughts on Brown’s investment practices last year. In a journal article this spring, Paxson effectively articulated the University’s role in fostering a community that allows for free speech and diverse perspectives while main-
taining safety and equality for all its members. And, Brown’s recent launch of the campus climate survey, sent to students last week, will help the University improve the student experience, especially in regards to antisemitism and other forms of discrimination.
Statistics and anecdotes are helpful, but the true vibrancy of Brown’s Jewish life can only be felt when on campus. As a Jewish student, I feel like I belong at Brown when the Hillel lobby is alive with chatter; when every seat at the Chabad dinner table is filled each Friday night; when I hear seniors inviting first-year students to their apartments for postOneg hangouts; and when I grieve with my friends one day, but then celebrate the next.
To those who have come before me and have built this joyous community — thank you. And to those who will join the Brown Jewish community in the next 130 years, I look forward to seeing how you continue to build a meaningful Jewish presence on College Hill.
Ethan Canfield ’28 can be reached at ethan_canfield@ brown.edu. Please send responses to this column to letters@browndailyherald.com and other opinions to opinions@browndailyherald.com.
ANISHA KUMAR / HERALD
MAX ROBINSON / HERALD
ARTS & CULTURE
REVIEW
In new album, Florence Welch shows how womanhood can be glamorous, ravenous
In confident, angry record, Welch is unafraid of the ugly and the animal
BY NORA ROWE SENIOR STAFF WRITER
Florence + the Machine’s newest album, “Everybody Scream,” was released on Halloween — a fitting date for a work so haunted and imploring.
Florence Welch, the group’s singer-songwriter, has been a fixture of the indie rock world for years. Now, she’s fully embraced her status as a star, and “Everybody Scream” is full of the insecurity and experimentation that often comes with a long time in the spotlight. Few people have experienced the hyper-visible world of stardom, so when artists sing about it, they must be both honest and relatable. Welch pulls this off flawlessly.
“Everybody Scream” is a musical reckoning with both Welch’s career and her personal life. Like a witch’s incantation, the first tracks are bold and angry. Welch’s voice is soaring — almost operatic — as she uses dramatic metaphors and fantastical illusions to convey her relationship with fame and her body. True to the album’s title, she screams.
But this doesn’t keep Welch from being heartbreakingly vulnerable. In “Sympathy Magic,” one of the record’s standout songs, she sings about her journey on the stage and in her personal life. She conjures the
image of herself “crouched in a ball gown / Anxious and ashamed,” and proclaims, “I no longer try to be good.” The lines give the impression that Welch is like a wounded animal, lashing out.
sexism in music with seething sarcasm. She sings that she’ll “be up there with the men and the ten other women (Ah-ah) / In the hundred greatest records of all time (Ah-ah).” The song is full of witty poeticisms and cheeky bites at the music world: “So like a woman to profit from her madness,” she sings, noting that “it must be nice to be a man and make boring music just because you can.”
In some of her strongest points in the album, Welch lets the record slow down. The most acoustic track, “Music by Men,” is like a crack in the monster’s skin, baring Welch’s heart. “Let me put out a record and have it not ruin my life,” she implores.
This imagery is characteristic of much of Welch’s songwriting: She is unafraid of the ugly, the gory and the animal. Her music frequently draws from the connection between horror and femininity. In the song “Kraken,” for instance, Welch asserts herself both as a woman and a monster: “My tentacles so tender, as I caress your cheek,” she sings.
as she may sing about desiring beauty, she doesn’t depict herself as just “beautiful.”
Rather, as Welch sings in “Kraken,” she is both “glamorous and ravenous.”
It is this courage that truly sets Welch apart from her contemporaries. As much
But that doesn’t mean it’s easy for Welch to embrace femininity in the music industry. In “One of the Greats,” a triumphant and rageful track, Welch denounces
Welch’s present-day experience with womanhood is informed by her life in the spotlight and by her 2023 miscarriage, which she discussed in a vulnerable interview with The Guardian that explored the basis of “Everybody Scream.” In the band’s most recent record, she conveys a complicated and often adverse relationship to femininity. The Florence Welch of “Everybody Scream” is bold, ravenous and angry — traits traditionally associated with men — and she lets her strikingly low voice reach its depths. Still, Welch is steadfastly committed to her feminine power. In “Everybody Scream,” she proves that womanhood need not be delicate: Instead, it can have teeth.
This article originally appeared online at browndailyherald.com on Nov. 3, 2025.
Providence Public Library displays RISD professor Cyrus Highsmith’s sketchbooks
would end up in a library exhibit, he said.
BY ANDREW HO CONTRIBUTING WRITER
In early October, a new exhibition titled “‘Everywhere I Go’: Sketchbooks from Cyrus Highsmith” opened on the third floor of the Providence Public Library at the Joan T. Boghossian Gallery. The exhibition displays a variety of sketchbooks created and curated by featured artist, Cyrus Highsmith, a senior critic of graphic design at the Rhode Island School of Design.
Jordan Goffin, the director of special collections at the PPL, first ran into Highsmith at an instructional session on the library’s various artistic collections.
When Goffin asked Highsmith if he would donate his sketchbooks to the PPL, Highsmith was initially “pretty surprised,” never imagining that his sketchbooks
“But I loved it. I really believe in public libraries,” Highsmith added. He curated his own exhibit and chose which of his sketchbooks would be on display.
To decide which would make the cut, Highsmith simply flipped through the books and chose the pages he liked the best, he said. His goal in curating the exhibit was to convey the “process” of creating a sketch, trying “not to be so focused on the results,” he added.
Photo of the “Everywhere I Go,” exhibit showing various clear display cases of open sketchbooks and large, bold blackand-white drawings displayed on the walls.
When describing his artistic journey, Highsmith noted that he has always been surrounded by art. “My mother’s an artist, so I’ve been drawing and making art all my life,” he said.
Although his mother wanted him to pursue painting, Highsmith studied graphic design as an undergraduate at RISD. After graduating in 1997, he realized
how much he actually enjoyed drawing — having developed an interest in typography and sketches while on College Hill. Highsmith credits one of his teachers, former RISD Professor Jan Baker, who encouraged students to sketch for her class, with sparking the beginning of his sketchbook journey.
After graduating, Highsmith continued to extensively produce typefaces, mainly for newspapers and publication designers. Over the years, though, his work and interactions with other designers inspired him to continue sketching. For Highsmith, letters are a “very challenging thing to draw,” and he was especially attracted to drawing them in his books.
“I’m proud of (my) 30 years worth of sketchbooks,” Highsmith said. Looking back at his exhibit, he said, “I had that many books on my shelf, and they’re fun
to look at.”
Highsmith hopes that his exhibit motivates young, aspiring artists to begin creating their own sketchbooks. “It’s had such a big impact on my career, and I hope that it could have that kind of impact on other people’s work,” he added.
Highsmith also runs Occupant Fonts, a brand of Morisawa, Inc. — a typefacing company that combines Western and Japanese styles.
Highsmith teased that he’s working on a new Korean-language children’s book that will feature his artwork. Through the process, he’s been learning about the Korean writing system and working with a publisher in Seoul.
Photo of a sketchbook viewed in a clear display case. The sketchbook is open to a page featuring a drawing of someone viewed in side profile and wearing glasses, with
various notes and another face sketch on the opposite page.
“I’m really excited about (it),” he said. “It’s very poetic.”
Once the “Everywhere I Go” exhibit wraps up at the end of December, visitors may set up an appointment with the special collections department if they wish to physically turn the pages of Highsmith’s sketchbooks, according to Goffin.
Goffin emphasized that the department’s mission is to provide a broad community of researchers access to their collections and materials.
“(We) want people to be aware that anything we have here, they can come in and use on an individual basis,” he explained. This article originally appeared online at browndailyherald.com on
COURTESTY OF UNIVERSAL MUSIC GROUP
As much as she may sing about desiring beauty, Florence Welch refuses to be limited by being “beautiful” in her work.
The exhibit is on display in the PPL through December
SIDNEY LIN / HERALD
The “Everywhere I Go” exhibit at the Providence Public Library on Tuesday. Cyrus Highsmith hopes his exhibit motivates young, aspiring artists to begin creating their own sketchbooks.
SIDNEY LIN / HERALD
FEATURE
Brown Ballroom Dance Team helps students find their rhythm
The club travels across Northeast, hosts annual competition
BY DONNA ZHANG SENIOR STAFF WRITER
For nearly three decades, Brown Ballroom Dance Team has provided students with a space to learn partner dancing, compete at collegiate tournaments and make new friends. Since many members start from scratch with no prior dance experience, the club does not require auditions — a feature that aims to promote a welcoming culture, club leaders told The Herald.
Marshall O’Callaghan ’28, a treasurer for the club, played tennis in high school. His athletic experience leads him to approach dance from a “sports mindset,” he said.
“I have little to no dance background,” he told The Herald. When he arrived at Brown, O’Callaghan wanted to “pick up a new sports activity,” and he found himself drawn to the community and competitive opportunities offered by BBDT.
More than experience, what matters is “how hard you work and how much time you put in,” O’Callaghan said, adding that he has met some of his best friends on the team.
“Everyone is trying to help everyone else be the best version of themselves,” he said.
Bri Seaborn ’27 also found the collaborative environment to be one of the most rewarding aspects of the team.
“Partner dancing requires a great deal of vulnerability,” she said. “I wanted to push myself to see how much I could improve.”
Seaborn, who co-captains the team, said that she works to create the same welcoming community that first drew her in. Despite coming to Brown with no knowledge of ballroom dancing, Seaborn was “hooked” after her first competition, she said.
“We really foster an environment where people feel comfortable enough to break out of their shell,” she added.
Each week, members can attend ballroom dance sessions, which are separated by skill level but open to all. During competitions, dancers are grouped based on the number of semesters they have spent on the team and previous competitive performances.
“We are one of the strongest teams in the Northeast,” Seaborn said, adding that BBDT has several dancers who compete at the highest levels — gold and open. “We tend to place in finals in each of the competitions we attend,” she added.
On Oct. 26, the team hosted its 29th annual Brown Ballroom Competition at the Mount Saint Charles Academy in Woonsocket, Rhode Island, Seaborn said. In addition to teams from across the Northeast, including from Massachusetts and Connecticut, the event featured approximately 40 competitors from Brown.
“Putting on a competition is quite difficult,” Seaborn said. Because BBDT doesn’t have access to an on-campus space large enough to accommodate intercollegiate events, the team has to
search for venues independently, she added. BBDT also has to hire a team of judges and acquire the technology necessary to livestream, record and score the competition.
“We have a lot of help from the Providence community,” Seaborn said. “We would not be able to put the competition together without that joint support.”
The club also hosts social opportunities outside of competitive dancing. Ian Chow ’28, a social chair for the team, explained that students “could be a part of our club, never participate in competitions, but still be really involved.”
The team organizes multiple social dances each year, encouraging students to meet new people and practice in a casual environment. “We want to make sure our club is a space for all commitments, all levels, all interests,” Chow said.
Every March, the club also hosts Dancing with the Professors, an event modeled after the American reality television series “Dancing with the Stars.” At the event, team members pair with Brown faculty for a dance showcase. “Last year was our first time doing it (since) COVID,” Chow said. “We are definitely looking to increase attendance a lot more this year.”
For many newcomers, BBDT is an accessible entry point into Brown’s dance scene. Anya Brunker ’29, who joined the team this fall, said the club offered her a chance to keep dancing in college without the time commitment of ballet, which she had done for 15 years.
“I think if there was some sort of audition, I would have been less inclined
The team organizes two to three social dances each
to
new people and
to join with no experience,” she added.
Despite the competitive nature of the sport, Brunker has observed a spirit of team camaraderie within BBDT. “Everyone is really happy for everybody else,” Brunker said. “There’s a lot of cheering on your friends.”
“Sometimes we’ll even lose our voices after competition just because of all that screaming,” Chow said.
Brunker, Chow, Seaborn and O’Cal -
laghan all noted that BBDT’s inclusivity made their experiences on the team meaningful.
“It’s really nice to have some environment in this school where you have the space to make mistakes and to watch yourself improve,” Seaborn said.
This article originally appeared online at browndailyherald.com on Nov. 3, 2025.
New Hay exhibit showcases geological, social connection between RI, Sweden
BY CHLOE JOHNSON CONTRIBUTING WRITER
Earlier this semester, the John Hay Library opened their latest art exhibition, titled, “Shared Magma: An American and Swedish Collaboration on Sisterhood and Sister Ore.”
The exhibition displays work by Swed-
ish artist and exhibit curator Kajsa Eriksson, which aims to capture the significance of Cumberlandite — Rhode Island’s state rock — and titanomagnetitolivinit, two similar magnetic rocks found only in Rhode Island and Sweden, respectively. Each rock has the same composition of minerals — magnetite, feldspar crystals, olivine and iron — and will turn rust-colored if left outside in the elements, according to fellow exhibit curator Robin Wheelwright Ness MA’18, a senior library technologist in digital preservation at the Hay. Samples of rock, pieces from the library’s special
collections and Swedish archival material are also on display.
The exhibit also showcases the intersection between this shared geology and Eriksson’s decades-long friendship with Ness. The pair first met over four decades ago, when Ness was studying abroad in Sweden.
“We were basically immediately friends and have been friends ever since,” Ness told The Herald.
The idea for “Shared Magma” came in 2023 when Eriksson was painting atop Taberg — a mountain in Taberg, Sweden
— and noticed a sign explaining how the mountain’s rock is only found in one other place: Cumberland, Rhode Island. She immediately texted Ness, who has worked at Brown since 1990.
Later that weekend, Ness found Cumberlandite in the Blackstone River near her house. “It feels like it came to us,” Ness said. It’s “like the rocks wanted to be connected and we were there.”
In creating the exhibit, “we were hoping to point out the long history of some of our beautiful natural monuments and geological features around us, and to protect them,” Ness said.
The exhibit also hoped to “point to the value of sustained relationships,” she added.
“It’s not easy to maintain relationships over 40 years,” Ness said, “especially when you’re 3,000 miles away from each other.”
The exhibit’s displayed rock samples are accompanied by letters that Eriksson and Ness wrote to each other in the early years of their friendship, helping viewers draw both the emotional and physical connections between Sweden and Rhode Island.
Eriksson’s original artwork also features watercolors with iron-based pigments. Eriksson settled on this material because of her interest in the “analogy between landscape and body,” noting iron’s role in the human body. According to the Providence Journal, these pigments were ground from Cumberlandite in a lab at Brown.
She added that she chose watercolor because it’s “the only painting medium that is basically pigment on paper.” Unlike
many other mediums, watercolor lacks additives like wax or oil.
One of Eriksson’s pieces displayed in the exhibition includes “Huggen, Hugga, Huggas” or “Chopped, chop, chopped,” which features two hanging mobiles. Each mobile was painted by Eriksson, but an ocean apart — one on top of the mountain in Taberg, and the other atop Cumberland’s Iron Mine Hill, a prime location for Cumberlandite. Hanging behind the piece is “Friendship Field Painting at Iron Mine Hill,” a photograph of the two friends creating art on the hill.
Curating the entire exhibit took about two years, Ness explained. While the two friends collaborated closely on every aspect, Ness took on more of the research component because of her connection to Brown faculty members and the Hay’s collection materials. Meanwhile, Eriksson worked with local historians and primarily took on the artistic components.
For Ness, curating the exhibit provided perspective.
“When you’re looking at a billion years of history, and you know you can touch something that’s been around for that amount of time, it does affect your thinking about day-to-day events,” she said.
After the Hay exhibit closes in 2026, Ness and Eriksson hope to modify it and move it to Sweden. The two also hope to create an artist book — written in both Swedish and English — to further document their work.
COURTESY OF KENNA LEE VIA BROWN BALLROOM DANCE TEAM
semester, encouraging students
meet
practice in a casual environment.
Kajsa Eriksson, Robin Wheelwright Ness MA’18 curated “Shared Magma”
CUNYAN MA / HERALD
The "Shared Magma: An American and Swedish Collaboration on Sisterhood and Sister Ore” exhibit at the John Hay Library on Monday. The idea for “Shared Magma” came in 2023 when Eriksson was painting atop Taberg — a mountain in Taberg, Sweden.
SCIENCE & RESEARCH
CLIMATE
Studies help explain overestimations in impact of Greenland Ice Sheet melting
Current methods may not adequately consider retained meltwater
BY GALEN GIBB STAFF WRITER
The Greenland Ice Sheet — the second largest ice sheet on Earth — has been melting at its fastest rate in 12,000 years due to rising surface temperatures caused by man-made climate change, according to a 2020 study. The resulting meltwater now ranks among the greatest contributors to global sea level rise and threatens to destabilize major ocean circulation systems.
But two recent articles co-authored by Brown Professor of Environmental Studies Laurence Smith suggest that current measurements and simulations may not adequately consider processes that retain meltwater occurring on the Ice Sheet, leading to overestimations of meltwater runoff.
Current climate models are “largely right,” Smith said. But they pass over how meltwater can refreeze or pond instead of flowing into the oceans, which can lead to “10% to 15%” corrections, he explained.
While these adjustments are “more like tinkering around the edges,” Smith said researchers still “want the best physical understanding possible to get into these models.”
As part of their research, Smith and his collaborators conducted fieldwork in Greenland’s southwestern region. They focused on the ablation zone of the Ice Sheet, a lower-elevation area where more snow is lost than accumulated every year.
LINGUISTICS
COURTESY OF JONATHAN RYAN
A drone image of a Greenland Ice Sheet. When air temperatures rise and ice begins to melt and pond, “the Ice Sheet becomes darker.” Said Jonathan Ryan, lead author and assistant professor of ice and climate sciences at Duke University, in an interview with The Herald.
“Each summer, the seasonal snowpack melts away completely in this zone, exposing dark, bare ice that absorbs more sunlight and drives further melt,” wrote Matthew Cooper, who was the lead author on one of the papers and a climate researcher, in an email to The Herald.
Knowing that climate models were very likely overestimating meltwater runoff, the researchers found that meltwater refreezing in the porous ice surface is likely a major cause of inaccuracies.
The researchers measured the flow rate of a river in which meltwater was draining on the surface of the Ice Sheet using an instrument that “beams sound waves down into the water” to compute the water’s speed and depth, Smith said.
The team also drilled small holes along
the watershed perimeter, inserting bamboo stakes that water would refreeze around overnight. Over the course of a few days, the height between the top of the stake and the ice was measured to quantify the volume of ice lost. Because the researchers saw that the volume of ice lost did not equal the volume of water flowing out of the river, they realized that meltwater was somehow being retained, Smith explained. Leveraging computational modeling of the bare ice surface, the study demonstrated that meltwater produced during the daytime fills into the pore spaces of the top layers of the ice. But at night, temperatures plunge and the meltwater refreezes, Smith explained. In the following days, heat is dedicated towards re-melting that same body of ice, rather than generating new
runoff, according to the study.
Projecting the findings across the entire southwestern region of the Ice Sheet, the mass of meltwater “retained and refrozen within porous bare ice” amounts to “roughly 11 to 17 gigatons per year, equivalent to about 9% to 15% of modeled annual runoff from that sector,” Cooper wrote.
In flatter areas of the ablation zone, meltwater tends to pond, kickstarting a positive feedback loop that warms the Ice Sheet and furthers long-term melting. In a second study, Smith and his team worked to understand the warming effect caused by these ponds.
Ice sheets, which are usually white, have high albedo, or reflectivity. But when air temperatures rise and ice begins to melt and pond, “the Ice Sheet becomes darker,” said Jonathan Ryan, lead author and assistant professor of ice and climate sciences at Duke University, in an interview with The Herald.
This allows it to “absorb more solar radiation, and it melts faster,” added Ryan, who was formerly a postdoctoral researcher at the Institute at Brown for Environment and Society.
Because satellites lack the resolution to capture smaller surface meltwater reservoirs on the Ice Sheet, the team launched drones into the air that took pictures of the Ice Sheet at different GPS points.
Ryan then overlapped satellite maps of water on the Ice Sheet with maps showing the region’s albedo. By computing the difference between the reflectivity of areas filled with surface water and that of areas with no water, he showed how albedo varies with water coverage. He was then able to
quantify heating of the newly documented meltwater by applying this relationship to the drone images, Ryan explained.
According to the study, meltwater ponding accounted for around 1% of the total heating from sunlight across the entire Greenland Ice Sheet in the summer of 2019. But depending on the time of year, elevation and the size of a given area, ponding can lead to a much greater proportion of albedo variability and heating.
The fieldwork supporting the research in these studies is “intense,” Smith said. For Ryan, doing the fieldwork was “very rewarding.”
“We camp right in the melt zone, pitch our tents, there’s water flowing all over the place,” Smith said. “We have to tether into harnesses and ropes (and) mark off a safe perimeter of the camp because there’s cracks and … slippy-sliding water.”
“I think it’s the reason why we all go into this field, to have these cool experiences where you have to perform at a high level,” Ryan said. “There’s a lot of time for being stressed, and there’s also a lot of time for having fun and working really well as a team.”
In the future, Smith and his research team aim to continue bridging the energetic processes captured in climate models with additional modeling to “describe what’s happening on and under the Earth’s surface,” which have yet to be thoroughly explored in the Greenland Ice Sheet, Smith said.
This article originally appeared online at browndailyherald.com on Nov. 3, 2025.
Why is everyone saying ‘6 7’? The science behind ‘brain rot’
Researchers say “brain rot” memes are symptom of societal pressures
BY LUCIA SANTIAGO CONTRIBUTING WRITER
This is the seventh installment in a series of articles about the science of various aspects of college life.
In a matter of weeks, “6 7” has transformed from two sequential numbers to a phrase so inescapable that first-grade teachers have resorted to banning it in classrooms.
“6 7” is a prime example of “brain rot,” which was named the Oxford Word of the Year in 2024 and has become a global phenomenon. From students posting memes on Sidechat to professors lecturing about Labubus, references to short-form social media content are infiltrating everyday
life — including on College Hill.
Anoushka Singh ’29 said she has “suffered from an extreme case of brain rot.”
“If you just mindlessly consume media the whole day and don’t understand what you are consuming, you have brain rot,” Singh said.
“I was sent a video by my sister the other day, and she was doing all these motions to ‘6 7,’” Noah Matsunaga ’29 said, laughing. “I was like, ‘That’s a new one for me.’”
But is “brain rot” just a humorous term
to describe chronically online jokes, or is it indicative of something deeper happening in our brains?
Content creator and linguist Adam Aleksic, who goes by the username @etymologynerd on his TikTok account with over 800,000 followers, defined “brain rot” in an email to The Herald.
“‘Brain rot’ has two definitions: social media content that is perceived to be mentally deleterious, and a meme aesthetic associated with that content,” Aleksic wrote.
Aleksic — who wrote a book titled “Algospeak: How Social Media Is Transforming the Future of Language” — provided some explanations for why brain rot currently seems unavoidable.
“Behind the cycle of rapid creation is a phenomenon I call the engagement treadmill: a positive feedback loop where a trend exists, the algorithm starts pushing the trend and then influencers play into the trend in hopes of being propelled in the algorithm,” Aleksic wrote.
This cycle only further accelerates these trends, which then infiltrate people’s everyday lives.
When people refer to “Labubu matcha Dubai chocolate” or “skibidi rizz Ohio” — examples Aleksic cited — they “humorously play into online oversaturation of certain ideas and commercial aesthetics,” Aleksic wrote. Once these memes become popular enough, they are “added to the greater canon of brain rot.”
Aleksic is not the only person who has attempted to analyze this phenomenon.
Emilie Owens is a doctoral research fellow in the Department of Media and Communication at the University of Oslo who studies children’s media and digital
participation. In June, her paper titled “‘It speaks to me in brain rot’: Theorising ‘brain rot’ as a genre of participation among teenagers” was published in New Media & Society.
Adolescents are drawn to “the seeming absurdity of brain rot, its total lack of coherence and its general inaccessibility to adults or those who are not ‘in on the joke,’” Owens wrote in an email to The Herald.
But adults are not immune to brain rot, according to Owens. She wrote that the phenomenon can be interpreted as “the human drive to decompress, which is met by the consumption of brain rot, that is mindless or childish or unproductive content.” Owens sees Gen Alpha’s love for brain rot as analogous to “re-watching ‘Friends’ or ‘Gilmore Girls’ for the twentieth time.”
Owens wrote that teenagers today face “a time of heightened pressure,” which leads to them relieving that pressure by “rotting one’s brain.”
“Ironically, however, TikTok is also one of the media via which such social pressure heightens; in this context, brain rot is something of a double-edged sword,” she wrote.
When teenagers scroll on social media, it continually stresses them out, resulting in a never-ending cycle of overconsumption.
“We like to think of the internet as a separate thing, but it plays a huge role offline,” Aleksic wrote.
TALIA MERMIN / HERALD
UNIVERSITY NEWS
Brown begins to implement University-wide AI tools
Transcribe is the first AI tool developed, released by the University
BY ALEJANDRO RUIZ SENIOR STAFF WRITER
On Oct. 20, the Office of Information Technology launched Transcribe, the first artificial intelligence tool developed for the broader University community by the Brown AI Sandbox project.
The release is part of a broader initiative to integrate AI tools into the University’s resources, as Brown shifts to institutional adoption of the new technology.
Last spring, the students also gained free access to Google AI services through their Brown accounts, including Google Gemini Chat and NotebookLM.
Transcribe was developed in the University “in partnership with a number of faculty and staff,” Christopher Keith, the vice president of information technology and chief information officer, wrote in an email to The Herald.
“It performs better and costs much less than similar commercial transcription services,” he added.
Michael Littman PhD’96, the associate provost of artificial intelligence, noted that he thinks this service will be particularly useful for faculty in the social sciences “who do some of their experimentation in interviews.” It is available in Arabic, Chinese, Dutch, Spanish, Italian, German, Russian, Portuguese, Japanese, French and Vietnamese.
“We think these tools are extremely relevant to the business” of universities, Littman said. “They shouldn’t just be available to people on campus who have their own personal resources to pay for
STUDENT LIFE
them.” The pricing for premium large language models typically falls around $20 per month.
He added that “students and faculty are really creative about coming up with ways of using this tool.” While there is a concern of increases in students using AI to cheat, Littman believes that students at Brown “don’t want to undermine their ability to actually learn material” by relying on AI.
The OIT cleared Gemini and NotebookLM for level three data, the highest safety clearance possible.
This clearance ensures that Google cannot train their models with any University data, according to Littman. The institutional accounts are better suited “for anyone who handles sensitive University data” and for protecting student personal data, Keith said.
Transcribe has not yet received this clearance, Littman said. According to the announcement, Transcribe is cleared for sensitive data from level 1 to 2.
While Gemini cannot repurpose any Brown user data, Keith said that a select few OIT staff can access individual usage logs — including the content of chat queries — in “specific and rare situations.”
Brown can “monitor, access, preserve, disclose and secure” any data without prior notice, the Acceptable Use of Information Technology Resources Policy reads.
But the policy also states the University “respects the reasonable privacy expectations of its students, faculty and staff.”
Keith shared that the University plans to continue to develop its own AI services within the AI sandbox suite, including a service called Librechat, which will provide a large language model that consolidates popular models into a single chatbot.
As the University launches new AI
The release is part of a broader initiative to integrate AI tools into the University’s resources.
tools, the OIT plans to work closely with the Sheridan Center for Teaching and Learning, including via the Generative AI in Teaching and Learning Committee, chaired by Littman and Eric Kaldor, director for assessment and interdisciplinary teaching programs at the Sheridan Center.
“I hope more students and faculty will feel comfortable exploring the capabilities and limitations of LLMs in their fields of expertise,” Kaldor wrote in an email to The Herald. “It will be important for them to develop critical AI literacy.”
Some students that The Herald spoke to were unaware of Brown’s partnership with Google AI, despite the fact that it was announced to the campus community last spring.
Hilary Nguyen ’27 recently noticed she had access to premium features on Gemini services while using it, but she was not
aware this was because of Brown’s partnership with Google AI, she said. She noted that she occasionally uses AI to help her understand figures from her biochemistry readings, but she more consistently uses ChatGPT.
Nick Burleson ’29, who also prefers ChatGPT, was unaware of his ability to access Gemini through Brown. As AI continues to evolve, he believes the University should have “stricter measures” to prevent abuse.
Before the semester began, Seth Rockman, professor of history and the department’s director of undergraduate studies, wrote a memo to the history faculty voicing concerns about the growing presence of AI in classrooms, advising faculty to anticipate an increase in AI use.
He also expressed concern about the technology’s impact on students’ preparation for careers after graduation. “The
only way you’re going to get a job is if you have the skills, sensibilities and instincts that exceed AI,” he wrote in the memo.
Some faculty have already begun to incorporate Gemini in their curriculum.
Professor of Physics James Valles allows students to use AI for various assignments in his course. His syllabus states that he uses AI to generate course activities and resources. He also provides guidelines for properly crediting and reflecting on AI usage.
“I support the efforts that the University… (is) making to assess the current use of Gen AI and expectations about how it might be used in the future,” he wrote in an email to The Herald.
This article originally appeared online at browndailyherald.com on Nov. 2, 2025.
How pre-dental, pre-veterinarian students navigate career pathways at Brown
At least 16 are applying to dental school, five are applying to vet school
BY ALEJANDRO RUIZ SENIOR STAFF WRITER
Many students come to Brown hoping to pursue a career in health care. While some students choose to attend medical school, others look to less common pathways like dentistry and veterinary science.
This year, at least 16 Brown students are applying to dental school, and at least five are applying to veterinary school, according to Associate Dean of the College for Preprofessional Advising Ginger Fisher.
According to Fisher, Health Careers Advising wants students to “think broadly” about the ways they can pursue a career in health care.
“While an MD is one path to a fulfilling career supporting the health of others, it is really just one of many such careers,” she wrote in an email to The Herald.
The Herald spoke to pre-dental and pre-veterinarian students to learn more about their experiences pursuing these pathways at Brown.
Students find community during pre-dental journey
Matthew Fang ’28 began his journey to dental school thinking it would be an “easier route” compared to medical school, he wrote in an email to The Herald.
But he ended up finding that the dental school application process “is pretty intense,” he added.
Dental and medical schools have similar requirements for prospective students. For both programs, students are encouraged to take similar science courses, conduct research, volunteer and seek clinical experience. But instead of sitting for the Medical College Admission Test, pre-dental students take the Dental Admission Test, also known as the DAT.
While the pre-dental track has been
“harder than (he) had imagined,” Fang’s passion for the field — which was sparked when he shadowed a dentist prior to attending Brown — continues to motivate him, he wrote.
Pre-dental students also find support among their peers, according to Fang, who is the underclassman representative for the Brown Pre-Dental Society. Prior to serving on the society’s executive board, Fang was “only really close with one or two other pre-dental students,” he wrote.
Lily Yu ’26, who is the society’s vice
president, added that the club offers various opportunities for students to engage with the field. The society provides students with relevant information about American Student Dental Association events, dental school applications and volunteer programs.
Yu began considering dentistry after she met another pre-dental student on her dance team at Brown.
Dentistry, Yu discovered, has a “a very unique balance of long-term patient care and hands-on skills,” she said.
Pre-veterinarian students struggle with ‘less streamlined’ requirements
Compared to the requirements for medical school, dental school and other health care programs, the requirements for pre-vet students are “way less streamlined,” according to pre-vet student Sofia Kassalow ’26.
Some veterinary schools require prospective students to take classes not offered at Brown, such as animal nutrition.
Kassalow added that she studies environmental science because Brown does not offer a zoology concentration.
Tristen Ventura ’26 said he had to take some of these courses at other schools in order to apply to his top-choice veterinary schools. In addition, to accommodate the requirements of different veterinary schools, Ventura had to decide which schools he wanted to apply to early in his college career.
Fisher noted that while some Brown students take pre-vet classes outside of the
University, she has “found this to be the case for only a small number of students and courses.”
Throughout his pre-vet journey, Ventura has looked to current and past pre-vet students for guidance, he said.
Until ecently, there were no student-led organizations focused on the pre-veterinary track, according to Ventura. But he added that the Brown Veterinary and Animal Science Society, a new student group that he is helping organize, is having their first interest meeting this fall.
Kassalow “had a tough time the first couple years at Brown because (she) felt like there wasn't a central place (she) could go for information,” she said. But she eventually found that Brown’s pre-health advising resources were helpful once she figured out how to properly use them.
Being a veterinarian has been Kassalow’s dream since she was about five, she said. Similarly, Ventura grew up taking care of sick fish and hopes to go into aquatic medicine.
Ventura believes many children dream of being a veterinarian but eventually give up on this goal.
“When they hit college, they do not have the support and it just becomes an unrealistic goal,” Ventura said.
“The resources are there,” Kassalow said. “They are just tough to find.”
MAX ROBINSON / HERALD
KENDRA EASTEP / HERALD
UNIVERSITY NEWS
intimidate.”
At the event, Rice said she doesn’t foresee a monumental peace agreement ending the conflict. “I don’t think it’s going to be a big peace treaty,” she said in her talk. “It’ll just be a ceasefire at some point.”
“This war does need to end,” Rice said. “We just (have) to figure out a way to make Vladimir Putin understand it needs to end.”
When serving on former President George H.W. Bush’s National Security Council about five months before the collapse of the Soviet Union, Rice helped write the president’s 1991 “Chicken Kiev” speech. Delivered in Ukraine, the remarks cautioned against “suicidal nationalism” — reckless protest that can evoke a repressive response — and received backlash from Ukrainian nationalists.
Since then, Rice has been an ardent supporter of Ukraine — calling on the U.S. to provide more weapons and money to the country’s forces and advocating for admitting Ukraine to NATO.
When asked who she sees as America’s biggest foreign threat, Rice said China was the “broadest competitor,” citing the race over artificial intelligence.
“I want to make sure that on anything that’s really a breakthrough, we get there first, because we are going to have some bad things (that) are going to happen,” Rice said about the emerging technology.
“If there’s going to be a generally intelligent robot, I want her to speak English, not Chinese, because I trust us with that kind of technology,” she said, adding that the scrutiny of the press and congressional hearings will hold the tech companies making these innovations accountable.
Reflecting on her time in office
In an interview with The Herald, Rice reflected on her political career in the President George W. Bush’s administration.
After the Sept. 11 attacks, the United States “didn’t have a playbook” on countering terrorist attacks, she noted. At the time, the public often did not understand the administration’s decisions regarding the attacks and suspected terrorist activity in Afghanistan “in part because President Bush didn’t want the American people to worry about terrorism,” Rice told The Herald.
Following the attacks, the Bush administration authorized a military invasion of Afghanistan that attempted to overthrow the Taliban — a conservative Islamist political and militant group — and combat al-Qaeda, a transnational terrorist group.
The intervention would last nearly two decades — becoming the United States’ longest war — while costing the U.S. tens of billions of dollars and killing tens of thou-
sands of Americans and more than 100,000 Afghan troops and civilians.
During her tenure as national security advisor, Rice voiced support of the 2003 invasion of Iraq, defending the decision as necessary to counter a suspected weapons program under Saddam Hussein. It was later revealed that Iraq did not possess weapons of mass destruction.
During the event, Rice said that “the lives lost there will never be brought back, and for that, I still have regret.”
Various Democratic policymakers and civil rights groups criticized Rice for permitting the CIA to waterboard a suspected al-Qaeda terrorist, a move that potentially violated federal laws and the U.S. Constitution.
While in office, Rice faced a “difficult balance” between idealism and pragmatism, she said. “I think you have to always try to keep ideals at the center.”.
But “even if you have a set of goals out there, that a place like Afghanistan might have a chance of democracy, or a place like Iraq might have a chance of democracy,” there are daily practical decisions that need to be made for progress to occur, she added.
During her lecture, Rice said she be-
lieves “the world is better without Saddam Hussein.” She added that “Iraq is a fragile democracy, but nonetheless democracy, and I think if we can stand by them, that they may get it right.”
Almost two decades after its initial military invasion, the United States’ troops withdrew from Afghanistan in a monthslong process that ended in August 2021. Rice described the withdrawal from Afghanistan as “rather abrupt.”
“I think we lost patience with a country that we knew would have difficulty,” Rice added. Now that the U.S. has left Afghanistan, she is especially worried about “the state of women” in the country with the Taliban back in power.
Student activism and bridging political divides
For students who feel disillusioned by the current state of American diplomacy, Rice, who is a professor at Stanford, called on them to engage in public service through nonprofit work, working on a political campaign or joining a civic organization, like a Boys and Girls Club.
While Rice noted the role of student
activism on college campuses, she emphasized that students should “make (their) activism about helping people who can’t help themselves.”
“It’s important for students to have views (and) opinions and try to act on them,” Rice said. “I always say to my students, before you try to solve that problem, try to know something about it.”
At the same time, she urged students to “talk to somebody who might think differently about the problem.”
When individuals “wall themselves off and only talk to people who have the same views that they do,” they neglect important democratic values, Rice said.
Universities can be an essential site for discourse across political lines, Rice said. She said that she is “proud” that universities, including Brown, have been sites for both students and administrations to “hear views that are different than their own” and “debate those views from a position of actual data and evidence.”
While political extremism has existed “throughout human history,” Rice believes bridges can be built one conversation at a time. “Our problem right now is that there aren’t enough people who are willing to cross those lines,” she said.
Students and community members reflect on Rice’s visit
With almost 80% of students on Brown’s campus identifying as very or somewhat liberal or progressive, Rice’s Republican political history contrasts with the dominant perspectives at Brown.
In an email to The Herald, University Spokesperson Brian Clark wrote that “welcoming a broad diversity of perspectives on our campus is fundamentally important to advancing our core mission of education and discovery.”
“Regardless of any attendee’s political ideology, there will be insights on democracy, the national political climate and international affairs,” Clark added.
Prior to her talk, Rice told The Herald she was “happy to engage” with an audience that may be divided about her political record and perspective, but encouraged students to “know what (they’re) talking
about” first.
Daniel Solomon ’26, a member of the Brown Political Union, said Rice’s visit represents an opportunity to engage with a perspective he rarely encounters in the classroom.
“We owe her a great deal of respect,” Solomon added. “The whole concept of free inquiry is to listen to perspectives with which you may not agree.”
“I’m interested in understanding her perspective on some of our most pressing global challenges and how she views them in comparison to Secretary Clinton, through her different political lens,” Solomon said before the talk, referencing Clinton’s visit to Brown last week.
BPU member Gray Bittker ’27, an international and public affairs concentrator, saw Rice’s appearance as an opportunity to view U.S. foreign policy through the eyes of a practitioner who shaped it.
When universities platform politicians like Rice, “Brown has a dual mandate to allow the speaker to share their perspectives openly and also be challenged by the community,” Bittker wrote in an email to The Herald.
For AnnaLise Sandrich ’27, a writer for post- magazine, the event was a “cool opportunity” to hear from a political leader whose views differ from hers.
“There’s a lot of things that she has said … that I don’t agree with,” Sandrich told The Herald. “But at the same time, I think she does have a lot of insights.”
Antoinette Reed, a community member who lives on College Hill, was very impressed with Rice’s talk. Reed left feeling “optimistic” about the future of democracy, adding that Rice “didn’t grab at any political agenda.” At the end of the day, Rice believes the core of democracy is “constant contestation.”
“That’s how we get to better policy,” Rice told The Herald. “That’s how we get to something that looks like the truth. And universities have a lot to do to make sure that that’s happening for our students.”
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