UNIVERSITY NEWS Compensation will be distributed among students enrolled in spring 2020 semester
BY MIZUKI KAI SENIOR STAFF WRITER
President Christina Paxson P’19 will lead a search committee for the next provost, according to a Tuesday Today@Brown announce ment.The search follows an Aug. 11 announcement that Provost Richard Locke P’18 will depart from his role at the end of the 2023 academic year.
UNIVERSITY NEWS
THE BROWN DAILY HERALD BROWNDAILYHERALD.COM SINCE 1891 FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 9, 2022VOLUME CLVII, ISSUE 38 Thayer Street continues to see high turnover, closings over summer Page 2 First-years participate in orientation activities despite rain Page 3 School of Public Health discusses ongoing plans, academic initiatives Page 5 Metro U. News S&R 79 / 56 87 / 59 TODAY TOMORROW Gaber ’23: Overcoming grief takes communitytime,support Page 6 Commentary DESIGNED BY ANNA RYU ’25 DESIGN EDITOR NEIL MEHTA ’25 DESIGN EDITOR
NAT HARDY / HERALD
SEE ADMITTED PAGE 5SEE SETTLEMENT PAGE 4 SEE CALLAN PAGE 4SEE SEARCH PAGE 2
U. agrees to $1.5 million settlement in class action lawsuit
Mary Jo Callan was appointed as Vice President for Community Engagement and Stark Family Executive Director of the Howard R. Swearer Center for Public Service, effective September 1, according to an August 31 cam pus-wide email from President Chris tina Paxson P’19. This newly-established role ex pands on Callan’s previous position as the Swearer Center’s executive director. Callan’s duties will now also include reporting directly to the President’s Office on the Cen ter’s administrative operations and co-chairing Brown’s new Community Engagement Council, which will bring together University administrators to work on community and civic engage ment issues. As vice president, Callan will work to ensure that the University’s com UNIVERSITY NEWS Callan will continue to serve as Executive Director of Swearer Center
Callan named VP for Community Engagement
OF BROWN
Locke will assume a new role as vice president and dean of Apple Univer sity, The Herald previously reported. According to the announce ment, the search committee will be headed by Paxson and include nine members: Anna Aizer, profes sor of economics; Jennifer Fried man, professor of pediatrics and epidemiology; Nicole Gonzalez Van Cleve, associate professor of sociol ogy; Lawrence Larson, professor of engineering; Brian Meeks, professor of Africana studies; Govind Menon, professor of applied mathematics; John Mustard, professor of earth, environmental and planetary sci ences and environment and so ciety; Melinda Rabb, professor of English; and Sohini Ramachandran, professor of biology and computer science.Thecommittee, staffed by Mar guerite Joutz, chief of staff to the president, will meet in the coming weeks to find Locke’s successor. Paxson wrote that “members of the Brown community will have op portunities to engage in the search process and convey their views on the opportunities, challenges and pri orities ahead, as well as key qualities and experiences to seek in the next Provost.”Theprovost is involved in academics at the University as Brown’s chief academic officer, overseeing operations of the Col lege, Graduate School, School of Engineering, School of Profes sional Studies, School of Public Health and Warren Alpert Medical School. Paxson wrote that the pro vost “is responsible for ensuring
A student first filed the law suit in the U.S. District Court for the District of Rhode Island in April 2020, The Herald previ ously reported. Though the Uni versity committed to refunding 50 percent of students’ room and board fees for the semester, the University chose not to refund tu ition because classes continued remotely.InSeptember 2020, the Uni versity filed a motion to dismiss the lawsuit, The Herald previously reported. A U.S. District Court in Rhode Island judge ruled in fa vor of it in March 2021. In April
After attorney fees and compensation for the three plaintiffs, the University will divide the rest of the settlement funds among the roughly 10,000 students enrolled at Brown during the spring semester.
Mary Jo Callan hopes to make University initiatives for community engagement more accessible.
Nearly 70% of acceptclassadmittedof2026spots BY JACK TAJMAJER SENIOR STAFF WRITER
BY CALEB LAZAR UNIVERSITY NEWS EDITOR
A federal judge granted preliminary approval of a $1.5 million settlement in a class action lawsuit, which three students brought against the University seeking tuition and fee refunds for the spring 2020 semester when the Univer sity sent students home and switched to remote learning at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. The plaintiffs argued that moving to online classes and sending students home consti tuted a breach of contract, un just enrichment and conversion — deprival of personal property from an owner without consent — which entitled students to a refund, The Herald previously reported.Thethree plaintiffs in the class action suit will each receive no more than $2,000 in compensa tion, and up to 30% of the set tlement fund will go to attorney fees, to be determined at the Jan. 10 hearing, according to court documents. The rest of the com pensation will be divided among the nearly 10,000 students who were enrolled at Brown during the spring 2020 semester. A final approval hearing is scheduled to be held Jan. 10, 2023, according to court docu ments.
COURTESY UNIVERSITY
UNIVERSITY NEWS Paxson will chair search committee to identify Locke’s successor
First years cite Open Curriculum, class community as major draws to U. U. forms search committee to find next provost
Nearly 70% of students admitted to the University’s class of 2026 accepted a spot last spring, a record-high that slightly surpasses the previous rate set by the class of 2025, Dean of Admission Logan Powell wrote in an email to The Herald.The University removed home eq uity as an asset when calculating fi nancial need last October, which may have contributed to the high yield rate, Powell“Thisadded.ledto substantial and positive
BY SOFIA BARNETT SENIOR STAFF WRITER
Provost Richard Locke P’19 “made lasting contributions that have helped make Brown stronger across the entire academic enterprise,” wrote President Christina Paxson P’19 in a letter to the University community.
2 FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 9, 2022THE BROWN DAILY HERALD | NEWS
Thayer Street has continued to see high turnover, with several closings and some new openings since 2020. Four separate storefronts have shuttered in the past few months alone, with the street still feeling effects of econom ic difficulty caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.“Itseems like the people are the same, but a lot of the businesses are coming and going,” said Berks Shoes & Clothing sales associate Alia Del Borgo.Del Borgo, a Rhode Island na tive, has been working at Berks for six months and said that business has been going “quite well.” When she first started, she felt a sense of nervousness that customers were shopping more online, “but people come in and they want to try on shoes because it all varies from brand to brand,” she Althoughsaid.another Berks location in Boston did not end up working out, the shop has been “going strong on Thayer since 1980,” Del Borgo said.“It’s just crazy how quickly places come and go around here,” she added. Storefronts like Ayame Hibachi Express, which opened just over a year ago, Tropical Smoothie Cafe, Rev’d Indoor Cycling and Dojo on Thayer have permanently closed. Tropical Smoothie Cafe still has an open location in North Providence, according to its website, along with many other locations nationwide. Rev’d has six locations throughout Massachusetts.Starbucksistemporarily closed for renovations and is scheduled to reopen in October based on signs posted at the storefront. There is also an on going project in the 279 Thayer St. lot, the former location of Dojo and the Army Navy Surplus Store, which was purchased December 2020 by Mike Boutros, owner of popular Thay er mainstays Chinatown and Mike’s Calzones as well as the new Mighty Mike’sThePizza.project is currently in the demolition process, but there is a wait on some permits, Boutros wrote in a message to The Herald. He hopes to have the building and demo per mits shortly and estimates the proj ect will take about 12-16 months to complete.Boutros said that the buildings had asbestos, and warning signs regarding asbestos remain on the lot’s storefronts. A special license was obtained for asbestos remov al, which was “a long process, but nobody was put in danger due to it,” he wrote. Asbestos removal was completed in July. Boutros’s Mighty Mike’s Pizza opened May 10. Though the opening went well, “business has been kind of slow,” he wrote. He attributed this to most Brown and other local students being away from campus for the summer. Boutros was especially excited for first-years coming to campus.
“The customer service, food quality and overall restaurant is doing very well,” he wrote. But as a result of the pandemic, “there are higher prices and we oc casionally have a supply shortage,” Boutros wrote.
JLife Mart, a Japanese convenience store, opened in April, The Herald previously reported. Since opening, the business has been doing well, said owner Annie Hu, and with students coming back to campus, she hopes it will continue to get better.
DANIELLE EMERSON / HERALD Mike Boutros, owner of Chinatown and Mike’s Calzones, is hopeful that the return of University students to Providence will be a boon to business that slowed over the summer. academic excellence and advancing key academic priorities; leading a collaborative budgeting process; and strengthening diversity, equity and inclusion in partnership with colleagues.”Lockearrived at the University in 2013 to lead the Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs and assumed the role of provost in July 2015. During Locke’s tenure, he “made lasting contributions that have helped make Brown stronger across the entire academic enter prise,” Paxson said in the announce ment of his departure. The new provost will work closely with members of the Brown commu nity as well as Paxson to advance the University’s mission. “I want to extend my gratitude in advance to the members of the search committee for their commitment to this important search process,” Paxson wrote.
“The community on Thayer, as al ways, was and is very welcoming,” he said.Business has been good for Boutros’s other restaurants, Mike’s Calzones and Chinatown, which have been Thayer favorites for 20 years, wrote Boutros.
DANIELLE EMERSON / HERALD
Turnover on Thayer: many closures, new developments
METRO Owners, employees on historic street experience mixed businesses prospects
BY RHEA RASQUINHA SENIOR STAFF WRITER
Tiger Sugar, a new boba shop, opened in June, The Herald previous ly reported, and saw long lines for its grandDespiteopening.the success of newly opened establishments, there are still several challenges that businesses on Thayer face, owners and workers said. “The housing market has inflated so much … rent is so high, especially in areas like Thayer,” Del Borgo said. “I’m sure these businesses haven’t been able to accommodate and raise their prices without dealing with less business.”Maintaining a business on Thayer St. is “very, very hard,” said Wooma Cho, owner of bb.q Chicken + Soban KoreanBusinessEatery.has been “so-so,” she said, with only four people covering every thing from the register to serving to cooking. Work takes up a large amount of her time and makes it difficult to do much else, she said. Another area of concern for Cho was with the large amount of online order ing. She explained that online platforms take a portion of the profit that many restaurants need. “(We) prefer people call or dine in,” she said. Amid continuous changes to Thayer, Cho also expressed pride in her restau rant. “Places close, close, close,” she said, “but we’re still here.”
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“I think there were a bit too many activities,” Nimrit Ahuja ’26 wrote in an email to The Herald. “It wasn’t too bad when you understood what was required versus optional, (but) I don’t think there needs to be more activities.”Ahujasaid that her favorite activ ities were the pep rally and volleyball game. “It was really nice to feel the whole student body rally for our team, and there wasn’t the pressure to have the same conversation asking someone their origin state, major and dorm lo cation,” she wrote.
“Being a Bruno leader has been a unique opportunity that allowed me to experience the orientation my class of 2024 never had,” Chernysh wrote. “I am living vicariously through the first-years.” While Chernysh was able to ex ecute and experience several orien tation events alongside the class of 2026, the events were largely orga nized by the OWC’s first-year fellows, who served as oversight for the Bruno leaders.
FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 9, 2022 3THE BROWN DAILY HERALD | NEWS Despite inclement weather, class of 2026 celebrates orientation in person UNIVERSITY NEWS Orientation Welcome Committee hosts small group programming, social events
For Ahuja, the most helpful part of orientation was not one of the OWC activities, but rather her peer advis ing session with her Meiklejohn. “My Meiklejohn was very helpful and gave us her contact information and would send videos of how to do something in Courses@Brown if I texted with a question,” she wrote. Ahuja also appreciated the advice offered by the Bruno leaders. “I really appreciated when our Bruno leaders … were transparent and gave us their own advice or stories,” she wrote. “In-person orientation stands in stark contrast to online orientation,” Bruno Leader Natalie Chernysh ’24 wrote in an email to The Herald. Cher nysh’s first-year class arrived in January 2021 when COVID-19 restrictions kept orientation largely virtual. “This is not to say that the Ori entation Welcoming Committee did not do their absolute best in 2021,” Chernysh wrote. She added that Zoom meetings caused fatigue and ultimately could not compare to the excitement of an ice cream social with 1,500 new classmates, sipping mocktails at the orientation dance and the “loads of free swag” handed out at such events.
COURTESY Bruno COVID-19
OF AVERY OLIVER The University’s class of 2026 was greeted by 77
BY MAISIE NEWBURY SENIOR STAFF WRITER As the class of 2026 moved into their dorms Aug. 31, they were greeted by the Orientation Welcoming Committee — 77 Bruno leaders and six first-year fellows. This year’s orientation marked the beginning of the first fully in-per son, mask-optional orientation since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. But this year’s orientation came with its own obstacles. “Unfortunately, due to the weather conditions, small group meeting number four was remote and the drive-in movie and convocation were postponed,” said Melissa Aldana ’24, a first-year fellow on the OWC. Still, there were plenty of activities for stu dents to participate in.
leaders and six first-year fellows for the first fully inperson, mask-optional orientation since the beginning of the
pandemic. CLASS OF 2026, HERE’S WHAT YOU MISSED! Welcome to campus, class of 2026! Here’s what you missed last season: a deer broke into MoChamp, a skunk dined at the Ratty and a certain blue bear packed his bags and left our hallowed campus... MUKUL KHANNA / HERALD
Aldana oversaw the Bruno leaders assigned to orientation groups in Kee ney and Wayland. She worked closely with her team of 33 leaders, each of whom was responsible for 17 to 26 students.LikeChernysh, Aldana also had her orientation primarily online, and was excited about the fully in-person events.Aldana got involved with OWC as a Bruno leader last summer. After finding the experience incredibly re warding, she applied to be a first-year fellow this year and was accepted. After completing her training, she helped run recruitment for new Bruno leaders.“Once the staff was hired, we went into planning mode,” Aldana said. “A lot of orientation events are standard. We know we are going to have an ice cream social and orientation dance but we aren’t sure how.” While OWC remained cognizant of the risk of COVID-19, the mask-option al orientation passed with no significant outbreaks, Aldana said. “There were two Bruno leaders who had COVID who had to isolate. That’s it.” One aspect of COVID-19 protocols from Aldana’s and Chernysh’s freshman orientation remains: the small group structure. “Before COVID, there were no small groups,” Aldana said. “This has been a very instrumental change in how events are run.” If large events such as the dance and the ice cream social are intimi dating to some students, small groups allow for “intimate discussions” and room to “foster closer relationships,” Aldana“Workingsaid. orientation as a Bruno leader is one of the most rewarding and gratifying jobs you can have on campus,” Aldana said.“I can’t recom mend it enough.”
munity engagement initiatives are developed collaboratively alongside local community leaders to best reflect the city of Providence’s needs, Paxson wrote in the email. “As a part of (the Swearer Cen ter’s) recent strategic planning pro cess, we heard from more than 200 campus and community stakehold ers,” Callan said. “They shared their thoughts, concerns and ideas about how the Swearer Center, and Brown more broadly, can be most effective in our engagement, which deepened my understanding of what’s working, what’s not working and the ways we can help lead the search for the new director of civic engage ment, the email said. This newly cre ated role will seek to hire a communi ty leader with experience working in Providence and a deep understanding of the city’s neighborhoods, organiza tions and people. The University’s search for candi dates with connections to the Prov idence community reflects its desire to implement local voices intimately involved with the obstacles facing community members, according to Callan.Finding candidates with “a keen sense of the opportunities and challenges inherent in strengthen ing and sustaining Brown’s positive engagement within Providence and beyond” will be a hiring priority, PaxsonCallanwrote.isdetermined to achieve this goal by developing strong per sonal relationships with stakehold ers, adding that community support is essential to community engage ment.“Ibelieve that we all possess the potential to be change agents to cre ate a better community and world,” Callan said. “I think the real power to make that change lies between us, in our relationships and connections with others working toward a common purpose.”Callan said she aims to bridge both existing and emerging community work at the University in order to make local initiatives more “visible” and “acces sible.”“This way, members of the external community can connect more easily with potential partners at Brown,” Cal lan Callanadded. hopes that her education al background will help her facilitate stronger collaboration between the University and its surrounding com munities.“Mymasters in social work and doctorate in higher education policy and leadership have prepared me to cross institutional and cultural bound aries in service to social justice,” she said.Callan said she intends to increase the University’s involvement in areas such as “economic opportunity, sustain able futures and wellbeing for both its students” and the broader Providence community.Shazain Khan ’24, a project lead within Students for Educational Eq uity working with the Swearer Cen ter, said he is hopeful that Callan’s new position will open more doors for student organizations and ad vocates to more easily engage with the Swearer Center and collaborate to make a meaningful impact on the surrounding community. Khan commended the newly streamlined process of shifting the Swearer Center’s administrative re porting from the College to the Office of the President. “Before such a position was clearly delineated, it was hard to get different departments involved and working outside of their silos, which is a major administrative problem at Brown,” he said. Callan “will be such an incredible resource for expanding Swearer’s ef forts,” said Cecile Schreidah ’24, a Swearer Center Bonner Community Fellow. “Her gift for developing mean ingful relationships with those she works with will help connect people and institutions into helpful collab oration.”
4 FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 9, 2022THE BROWN DAILY HERALD | NEWS CALENDAR TODAY’S TOMORROW’SEVENTSEVENTS
Swearing-In Ceremony for Elvy, DPS 12:30Dogto1 p.m. Main Green Chemistry Colloquium with Ainissa Ramirez ’90 4 to 5 p.m. MacMillan 115 Master’s Student Happy Hour 4 to 6 p.m. 200 Dyer Street 259th Opening Convocation 10 a.m. The College Green Women’s Rugby vs. Sacred Heart 11 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. Marvel Field
Reclaiming Humanity in Palestinian Hunger Strikes 12 to 1 p.m. Online only
Getting Started with CareerLAB for First-Years 2 p.m. Salomon 101 Men’s Water Polo vs. MIT 6:30 to 8 p.m. Katherine Moran Coleman Aquatics Center 2022, students appealed the deci sion to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit before reach ing a settlement agreement with the University, according to court documents.Thoughthe University agreed to the settlement, Brown denies any wrongdoing.“Thediscovery process and court decisions showed there was no evidence that Brown had vio lated students’ rights,” Univer sity Spokesperson Brian Clark wrote in an email to The Her ald. “Despite the circumstances brought on by the pandemic, the University continued to provide students with a world-class edu cation, and students continued to learn remotely as they earned academic credit toward com pletion of their degrees. Brown appropriately refunded unused room, board and recreation fees, and continued to provide health care and campus activities ser vices funded by other student fees.”“While Brown remains fully confident in its Spring 2020 de cisions on tuition and fees, and all court rulings in the case have decided in the University’s favor, the settlement offers a more pro ductive resolution than a protract ed litigation process that would require financial and time invest ments better reserved for support ing student success on campus,” ClarkNationally,added.
college students have filed over 300 class action lawsuits accusing their institutions of breaching contract or unjustly enriching themselves through the transition to online classes and re duced programming at the start of theWhilepandemic.judges have largely dis missed such cases, some Univer sities have reached settlements with students. Last November, Columbia agreed to a $12.5 mil lion settlement in a similar case, and the University of Tampa agreed to a $3.4 million settle ment this May.
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Callanimprove.”willalso
“These are communities that are struc turally vulnerable that are going to be hit first, hit hardest and come out of a surge last.”
FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 9, 2022 5THE BROWN DAILY HERALD | NEWS
Public health interventions that fo cus on marginalized communities start in the classroom, Nuzzo said. “Brown is truly leading the effort to increase the diversity of students who are here. We cannot go through another pandemic with leaders who do not come from the communities that have been hardest hit by this vi rus,” Nuzzo said. “We need to make sure to train the next generation of leaders so we can develop plans that are reflective of the experiences and realities of the communities that the plans are intended for.” In his courses, Goedel emphasiz es the importance of applying public health scholarship to the outside world, he said. He teaches epidemiology as a tool his students can use to study everything from classic models of dis ease transmission to social issues. In his graduate course, his students work with the Rhode Island Department of Health to apply spatial analysis skills to local health issues. “I hope we can develop more of these practice-based opportunities for students so they can see where their skills go,” Goedel said. The panel concluded with a discus sion on the importance of good health communication.Publichealth scholars need to address misinformation and disinfor mation “head on,” Goedel said. With a constantly changing communication landscape, it’s important to utilize tools like social media to craft effective mes sages, he “Communicationexplained. exercises need to be incorporated into every corner of our training,” he said. “It’s not just, ‘Did you do the science?’ It’s, “Did you say it in a way that gets to the person who needs to hear it?”
The conversation moved to the im portance of public health researchers and advocates communicating with community members. “Often when we’re talking about data-driven decision-making, we’re talking about data generated in clinical settings or generated in the academy, but the people who are most directly impacted by these new challenges bring a lot of knowledge and data of their own,” Goedel said. Working with communities mar ginalized due to race or socioeconomic status is especially important, he noted.
BY KATHLEEN MEININGER SCIENCE & RESEARCH EDITOR
Following the remarks, a panel of SPH faculty, including Jennifer Nuz zo, director of the Pandemic Center at Brown and professor of epidemiology, Mark Lurie, professor of epidemiology, and William Goedel PhD’20, professor of epidemiology, was welcomed to the stage. Aubert kicked off the discussion by asking panelists about the impor tance of data collection in combating ongoing and emerging threats to public health, including COVID-19, monkey pox and new reports of polio in New York.“The data tells us these (public health issues) are hazards of our time, and we need to prepare for them like we would for other hazards, like fires or natural disasters,” Nuzzo said. But new data is needed on how to best prepare for these events to better address them in the future, sheLurieadded.discussed his new NSF-fund ed project, Mobility Analysis for Pan demic Prevention Strategies, which establishes a collaboration between public health, math, engineering and computer science researchers to study pandemic spread. The researchers are currently focused on developing wear able tracking devices to “harness data on mobility, population data and social interaction,” Lurie said. ”Unless we really understand the way humans interact, we’re going to be doomed to policies that are very broad,” Lurie said. “If we, on the other hand, are able to specifically under stand the context and environments under which certain people interact, then we are able to create interven tions that are specifically targeted to thoseThisbehaviors.”projectis just one example of the importance of interdisciplinary re search in creating innovative solutions to public health problems, Lurie said. As the discipline evolves to combat new public health threats, collaboration among disciplines is becoming increas ingly important, she added. “It was a screaming truth over the past two years that some of our largest problems in responding to COVID were not just limited to medical and public health constraints,” Nuzzo explained. Input from history, sociology, polit ical science and economics scholars is necessary “to make sure what we’re planning makes sense for our commu nities … (and) is sufficient to meet the needs of the people.”
School of Public Health panel highlights new initiatives, areas of focus SCIENCE & RESEARCH SPH faculty discuss future of public health research, education during address changes in the financial aid awards for many of our admitted students,” he said.Powell further attributed the yield to the return of three in-person “A Day on College Hill” events in April, which were “enormously popular” and allowed the University to “showcase the beauty of the campus” and the “strength of our community,” he wrote.The University also admitted 11 students off of the waitlist, 23 fewer than the previous class year, Powell wrote. In recent years, it has accept ed between two and 300 students off of the waitlist, The Herald previously reported.TheHerald spoke to multiple ad mitted students about their reasons for committing to Brown and their experiences so far as first years. Apart from praising the Open Curriculum’s flexibility and diverse offerings, the students cited a sense of community as a major draw to enroll. Akshay Mehta ’26, from Omaha, Ne braska, said he “genuinely felt a con nection” to the campus and appreciated having an “amazing Indian tour guide” who he felt could understand his culture as someone coming from a “predomi nantly white state.” He described getting lost on cam pus and having students try to help, explaining that he “toured about 15 colleges” but could feel the University’s “presence” and “community.”
Powell noted that he had received multiple emails from admitted stu dents and their families expressing their happiness with their decisions to commit. Powell recalled a specific email in which the parents of a Universi ty freshman wrote, “as a parent, you hope your child will be in an environ ment where they can thrive” and that they know their child will find that at Brown.Some emails sent to Powell de scribed the University as an “amazing, inclusive and diverse” campus and expressed that students love the en vironment, he wrote. Mehta, who participated in the Third World Transition Program, a pre-orientation program, specified that he enjoys “how much Brown embraces culture” and said he “felt very welcomed in a space” he wasn’t used to due to places like the BCSC and the work of the pre-orientation counselors.Allofthe students interviewed agreed that they were happy with their decisions to attend the Uni versity.Mehta said he has “no regrets” about committing, while Neuwirth noted that he “definitely” felt like he “made the right call” and is happy to be here.“I’m super excited to get started,” Neuwirth said. “I almost wish orienta tion was over.”
Levi Neuwirth ’26, from Wallkill, NY, recalled “dancing around the room” when he was accepted to Brown, his top choice school. In addition to enjoying the Open Curriculum and how “all of the pro grams seem to value that freedom,” he noted that the location of the campus is extremely convenient.
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In a panel discussion, School of Public Health faculty discuss the future of public health teaching and research.
“I’ve low-key been in love with the school since freshman year” of high school, he explained.
The School of Public Health hosted its 2022 State of the School Address at Ruth J. Simmons Quadrangle Thurs day. The event featured remarks from Provost Richard Locke P’18, Interim Dean of the SPH Ronald Aubert and Academic Dean Megan Ranney MPH’10, followed by a SPH faculty panel dis cussion about the future of pandemic preparedness.Sinceitsfounding in 2013, the SPH has expanded in both size and impact, Locke said. Funding from the National Institutes of Health, applications for the master of public health program and undergraduate research and ed ucation have been “thriving on every indicator,” he said. By working with the Rhode Island Department of Health, the Warren Alp ert Medical School and other collabo rators across the University, the SPH has been able to have both a local and national impact, he added. Ranney highlighted recent initia tives from the SPH which have created “a school that transforms how we study, teach and create public health locally, nationally and across the globe.” This year, the SPH launched a new online MPH program designed to offer working professionals around the globe access to public health education. The Health Equity Scholars program, an other scholarship and leadership de velopment program for MPH students, expanded from 12 to 19 scholars this year, she Ranneyadded.also highlighted some of the changes the SPH will undergo in the near future. In the coming year, a new full-time director of community engagement will work closely with President Chris tina Paxon P’19 to expand collabora tion with the Rhode Island community. Next year, the SPH will launch a new master’s program to allow existing clinicians to earn a one-year degree in public health. The SPH is also work ing to increase financial aid for public health students. “I am confident that a new, more di verse generation of public health lead ers will drive action where it is needed most, often in communities that are overlooked,” Ranney said.
KATHLEEN MEININGER / HERALD
“It’s within distance to a lot of awesome things,” he said. “People are saying, ‘we could take a weekend to go up to Boston, or toward New York … Providence is a really good fit, where it’s not so huge but it’s also not rural and there’s enough student life here that it’s a great middleReiteratingground.”the sense of commu nity on campus, Mehta appreciated the “collaborative environment” and said that while he has friends at other universities who say “how difficult it is to make friends,” every one at the University is welcoming andNeuwirth,sociable.who is planning to con centrate in physics, told The Herald before classes started that his experi ence so far has been “awesome” as he’s “gotten to meet some faculty” and has liked touring the buildings, especially Barus and Mehta,Holley.whoplans to concentrate in computer science, spoke about the “diversity of education” and was excited about being able to “learn whatever I want, plus CS at the same time.”He also said he hoped to have a “broad perspective” in the future through the Open Curriculum and has heard positive feedback about profes sors such as Andy van Dam, professor of computer science.
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Kathleen Meininger Gabriella Vulakh Midway through my study abroad experience in Paris, I was sitting in my European-sized single when I got a text from my dad at mid night. “Don’t panic, but call your mom.” I called my mom, who was in pieces. After a fall, my 86-year-old maternal grandmother was uncon scious in the hospital. My parents wouldn’t say it at first, but we all knew that she wouldn’t wake up. Two days later, on Friday, March 3, my mother soberly told me that my grandmother wasn’t going to make it. It was just a matter of days. I dropped everything and flew from Par is to Houston for a week of emotional limbo. There was nothing but my Teta’s floating spirit to occupy our lives. That week was hell, but it was cathartic and important.
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FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 9, 2022THE BROWN DAILY HERALD | COMMENTARY
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Once the week was over, I flew back to Paris. I started a virtual internship, caught up on my week of missed classwork, readjust ed to the time zone and continued as if that week never happened. I worked, studied and took weekend trips for which I had neither the time nor the money. I wandered aimless ly around Paris hoping to be zapped by artis tic inspiration. But there was a piece missing. No matter how hard I worked, I was distract ed and slowed down. No matter how much I traveled, I was always a little more tired than I wanted to admit. In moving on with my nor mal life so quickly, I prolonged my own grief and made my pain deeper. However, sadly but truly, there was no other option. Whether in France or in the U.S., supervisors, professors, hiring managers and even friends only afford ed me a week to bandage my trauma. Grief can be an intense, long-term and active pro cess, and we should all — especially the griev ing — view it as such. In “A Year of Magical Thinking,” Joan Didi on captures this beautifully: “Grief has no dis tance. Grief comes in waves, paroxysms, sud den apprehensions that weaken the knees and blind the eyes and obliterate the dailiness of life.” That happened to me. However, because I wasn’t afforded the time and space to heal from this loss, I didn’t think I deserved it. But why not? And why did that healing have to hap pen now? These waves of grief invaded me at random and unwelcome intervals while I tried to bury myself in work and find any possible way to salvage my study abroad experience. Of course, they only worsened when my paternal grandmother passed away during the last week of the semester. I left Paris behind, went home for her funeral (wearing the same black dress as in March) and then found myself alone again and away from my parents, all within five days. It almost seemed like part of a gruesome rou tine.Several months after my grandmothers’ deaths, I find myself in a new normalcy where my life is calmer, but I expect the calm to be upended by moments of sadness. This is espe cially the case because I had no time to process either of their deaths. I am not alone in that. Leaving grief unresolved by not taking ample time to heal can lead to more pain and frus tration in the long run. Further, because of the severity of the daily effects of long-term grief, the DSM-5 (“psychiatry’s bible”) has even start ed listing prolonged grief as a mental health disorder. Though this diagnosis remains contro versial among psychiatrists, its inclusion shows the magnitude and complexity of what it means to grieve.Despite the growing knowledge surround ing the medical phenomenon of prolonged grief, there is currently no federal policy in place to guarantee bereavement leave for em ployees. As a result, most grieving close fam ily members (spouses, parents, children and grandchildren) receive just three days of be reavement leave — paid or unpaid — from their place of work. This barely leaves enough time for grieving family members to plan a funeral service, much less to endure the life-altering experience of losing a loved one. My own par ents lost their mothers less than two months apart. Still, they each went back to work three days later — not because they thought they could, but because they wanted to keep their jobs. Some employees, including my mother, even have to apply for bereavement leave and hope that it is approved by their payroll de partments.Thecurrent workplace infrastructure for grief isn’t sustainable, so we should at least try to support those around us who are ex periencing long-term grief. A study from the National Institutes of Health has found that social support is especially important in trau matic grief. While many friends asked me how I was doing in the wake of my grandmothers’ deaths, these interactions were often one-off occurrences. Grief is unpredictable both in its acuity and its duration, so it’s important to check in periodically with those who are griev ing. Letting someone know that they are not alone in their daily struggle can make all the difference.Twoand a half years into the pandemic ac knowledging the reality of long-term grief is more important than ever. Those who lost loved ones from COVID may be at a higher risk for prolonged grief. Considering the amount of people that COVID has affected, it is ludicrous for workplaces to offer — in the best cases — three days of bereavement leave and then ex pect business as usual. Perhaps more importantly, no one should be expected to grieve in isolation. On cam pus, we have resources such as Counseling and Psychological Services and the week ly Bereavement Group at the Office of the Chaplains and Religious Life to help us cope with loss. Nevertheless, it is still incumbent on us as a student body to be there for our friends and classmates who are experienc ing grief. Since many of us live far away from our loved ones, shouldering a loss can be as lonely and isolating on College Hill as it was in my room in Paris. My school and work didn’t give me nearly enough time to put myself back together again, but the shared humanity of community — my family and my closest friends — got me through it. Commu nity can be what gets someone else through it, too.
Yasmeen Gaber ’23 can be reached at yasmeen_ gaber@brown.edu. Please send responses to this opinion to letters@browndailyherald.com and other op-eds to opinions@browndailyherald.com. How to carry on without keeping calm
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All populations want to live in peace
LETTER TO THE EDITOR
To the Editor:
FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 9, 2022 7THE BROWN DAILY HERALD | COMMENTARY
Seventeen years ago, as a first-year at Brown, I wrote an op-ed for The Herald respond ing to the vandalism and de struction of synagogues and Jewish-built greenhouses that followed the Israeli disengage ment from Gaza. My op-ed was entitled “Palestinians in Gaza are not ready for peace.” Looking at this op-ed today, I feel ashamed. It’s wrong to talk about a group as a mono lith like I did in that piece. And if there’s one generalization that can be safely made of any population, it’s that they want to live in peace. Human beings want to raise their children and celebrate milestones. They want to learn, work and gather in the safety that peace brings. I was ignorant to claim otherwise. I would be offended if any one wrote about my community using the language I used in that 2005 op-ed. I apologize to those who read it, and to Gazans and Palestinians in particular.
Boaz Munro
’09
Allan Tunkel was named the new health careers advisor expert in residence for the 2022-23 academic year, filling a vacancy left by the Aug. 3 departure of George Vassilev, former associate dean of the college for pre-professional advising.Tunkel previously served as the senior associate dean for medical ed ucation at the Warren Alpert Medical School. The University will search for a more permanent successor to Vassi lev while Tunkel serves in the position for the time being, according to Betsy Shimberg, senior associate dean of the College for co-curricular and experien tial Studentslearning.and alumni gathered over Zoom in a meet-and-greet session on Thursday with Tunkel, where he dis cussed his background in both medicine and research and answered questions from current and future applicants to health profession schools. “I’ve always enjoyed meeting with … and talking to students,” Tunkel said. “A lot of it is being available and having a lot of personal touch and one-on-one interaction with the students.” Until May of this year, Tunkel over saw the offices of Medical Education, Student Affairs, Admissions and Finan cial Aid, as well as the medical school administration and multiple master’s degreePriorprograms.tohisposition at Brown, Tunkel chaired the Department of Medicine at Monmouth Medical Center and served as the associate dean of admissions at the Drexel Uni versity College of Medicine, chair ing the medical school’s admissions committee.Tunkelspoke of his indirect path way to medical school, having had a “mediocre” undergraduate record — including a D in organic chemistry — and entering a PhD program in ex perimental pathology before attending medical school. “I would say I also know a lot about options if you don’t get into medical school, and with some students it will be important to explore those options,” TunkelAfnansaid.Nuruzzaman ’24, who is plan ning to apply to medical school during the 2023 admissions cycle, said he has a number of questions about MD/PhD programs.“I’mreally happy that Dr. Tunkel is actually a physician-scientist because he probably knows more about that process,” Nuruzzaman said. Alongside Health Careers Advisor Kathy Toro-Ibanez and nine peer ad visors, Tunkel will advise current and prospective health profession school applications, working with juniors, seniors and alumni. Karen Whittet, a career counselor at CareerLAB, advises freshmen and sophomores. Shimberg said that the University hopes to find a more permanent suc cessor for Vassilev “as quickly as we can while still getting the best candidate.”
Allan Tunkel previously served as the senior associate dean for medical education at the Warren Alpert Medical School. He is filling the vacancy left by the Aug. 3 departure of former dean George Vassilev.
BY HALEY SANDLOW SENIOR STAFF WRITER
Allan Tunkel to serve as health careers advisor
“I fully expect that that person will be in place in time to be working with us on the committee letter process” for the next admissions cycle, she added, referring to the holistic letter of rec ommendation written by members of the University’s health career advising committee submitted alongside medical schoolCommunityapplications.members will have the opportunity to share the qualities and characteristics they would like to see in the individuals considered for hire, according to Shimberg. “Some of the beefing up (of advising resources) was also in response to the BDH article that came out last spring where students were saying, ‘we need more advising,’” Shimberg said. “So we’re trying to put that in place.”
FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 9, 2022 8THE BROWN DAILY HERALD | NEWS
UNIVERSITY NEWS Health careers advising expands resources amid transition in leadership
COURTESY OF BROWN UNIVERSITY