Adding to the student loan debt.
Expressing gratitude to students of color for calling attention “to actions needed to address racism and injustice on our campus,” Brown President Christina H. Paxson has developed a plan and asked students, faculty and staff to comment on it.
The university plans to invest $100 million over the next 10 years on achieving the goals outlined in the plan, Paxson said in her introduction.
Called “Pathways to Diversity and Inclusion: An Action Plan for Brown University,” the 19-page plan outlines steps for “creating a just and inclusive campus community,” increasing the university’s racial and ethnic diversity and adding issues of race, ethnicity and identity to teaching and research on such topics as environment, health, technology and global affairs.
Paxson asks members of the Brown community to use an online feedback form to respond to the draft plan by Dec. 4. After that, revisions based on the responses will be made and the final plan will be released by Dec. 21, the end of the fall semester.
Saying the plan grew from discussions “over a long period of time, and reflects intense work,” Paxson said in her cover letter that it “has been profoundly informed, and substantially improved by recent campus conversations about structural racism. The deep pain that we have heard expressed by students of color in the past weeks and months — a pain that has been affirmed by faculty and staff members who work closely with and care deeply about our students — is very real.”
On Nov. 14, a Dartmouth student attending a conference designed to strengthen the network of Latino students at Ivy League schools, said he was assaulted by a public-safety officer. That afternoon, Paxson apologized and listened as delegates and students demanded diversity training, police accountability and that the officer be fired.
Students shouted “That’s not good enough” when she promised to investigate the incident and focus on larger, systemic problems.