The Brunonian ethos is grounded in a sense of individuality. Our education both in and out of the classroom is very much our own prerogative. We choose our courses from a plethora of options, restricted by nothing except the occasional capped course. The same goes for the student activities and organizations we join while we are here. Each of our Brown experiences will differ greatly from all others. Herein lies the conundrum. Where is the commonality? What makes a Brown student?
To an extent, it is the embrace of this freedom and great variety that defines the Brown student. We live and let live, and we appreciate each other for our uniqueness. It is the kind of environment that attracts independence and self-sufficiency. But a college community cannot be built simply around a sense of individuality. Yes, we all live and learn on the same campus - at least for now - but physical proximity does not suffice for a thriving social atmosphere.
There are two times when the Brown community gets together for a common, collective experience: to walk through the Van Wickle Gates as matriculating students, and to exit their auspices at Commencement. This is a tradition that we share with every other student who has ever completed a degree at Brown.
But apart from freshmen orientation, Spring Weekend and Senior Week, Brown social life has relatively few components that bring the whole community together. When it comes down to it, after freshman year, social life becomes rather disconnected. As we grow into our college selves, there is less and less communal spirit that unites us in our leisure hours. This is a natural development. As we join social organizations and develop a defined group of friends, the places we go and whom we go with become more set in place. Stability is comfortable, and many of us settle gladly.
It seems to me that social community is an important part of any college experience and that, at Brown, something is seriously lacking. Some schools rally around sporting events, others around Greek life and still others around residential colleges. Students at Jesuit colleges bond over what is sometimes a torturous core curriculum. At women's colleges it is the collective female experience. At small liberal arts colleges in the middle of the woods, students bond over having nothing to do but ward off the cold with each other in dank basements.
There are aspects of each of these types of experience at Brown, but nothing that unites them. Some may think Brown doesn't need the kind of community that I am talking about - that it is in fact anti-Brunonian to suggest that commonality is something we should strive for as a part of this experience. But I think community is a necessary thing, especially for college students. It gives us a way to reference our experience and mark it. It will also unite us once we leave campus as graduates.
Brown as an institution cannot thrive solely on each student's individual sense of self. Yet it is hard to imagine a Brown in which we don't exist. We make this place what it is - for ourselves, for each other and for posterity. So I ask all of you to reflect on your Brown experience. How can we reconcile the great variety at Brown, the variety that we bring to it, with a strong sense of communal identity?
I'm not saying that we should have a community that instructs us on how to act - that would be much too restrictive for the Brown student and would never fit here. But neither should we experience college life in a vacuum. Did you go to more than one Brown sporting event this year? Did you attend President Christina Paxson's inauguration? Have you been to a Convocation address since you were a first-year? If you have, congratulations. You are an upstanding Brunonian. If you haven't, shame. We are all busy people, but we are only going to get busier. While we are students of this great University we should take pride in this community and be active in its affairs.
The responsibility to build a sense of community lies with both the students and the institution. As students we come and go. Our existence at Brown is brief, but the institution is enduring. Yes, this institution exists for us, but it also transcends us. You're only in college once, and we've all decided to go through it here. That is a special thing and a cause for celebration or at least some school spirit. What makes a Brown student? You do. But what makes you a part of Brown?
Claire Gianotti '13 didn't go to President Paxson's inauguration and regrets the error. She can be contacted at claire_gianotti@brown.edu.
