Opinions - The Brown Daily Herald

Opinions

Herce '22, Torres '22, Castañeda ’21.5: 'Resilience in the face of adversity': How Brown continues to fail U-FLi students

By Sibeles Torres | January 28

Brown University holds a miserable track record of supporting its U-FLi (undocumented, first-generation college, low-income) students, who thrive in this hostile environment only by virtue of our own community’s organizing, care and mentorship. As U-FLi students, we feel like tokens whose life struggles ...

Opinions

Wrenn GS: Sex, Smut and Streakers

By John Wrenn | January 27

“Brown University, by everyone’s definition is the Ivy League brothel,” once reported the Dartmouth Review in 1986. But does Brown really stack up to this lofty reputation? And, are our hallowed, time-honored traditions safe from the puritanical tyranny of University Hall? Respectively: yes and ...

Opinions

Bhaskar '21: When unity isn't in the cards

By Nidhi Bhaskar | January 25

As the contentious “battle for the soul of our nation” drew to a close, President Biden took the stage last Wednesday after being sworn in as the 46th president of America. Throughout the inaugural proceedings, the new administration’s front of political cohesion and concord was emphatic, from ...

Opinions

Champa P'21: The Excellence in Athletics Initiative under oath

By Michael Champa | January 24

In a case that straddles the boundary between law and ethics, this month a federal judge denied the issuance of a preliminary injunction that would have reinstated Women’s and Men’s Varsity Squash. However, the judge also ruled that the athletes do have a valid contract claim against Brown for failure ...

Opinions

McGough '23: Biden may have only one shot — so radical change has to wait

By Jackson McGough | January 24

In the early months of 2009, three priorities dominated former President Barack Obama’s legislative agenda for fixing a broken America. The first, a “stunningly ambitious” stimulus package, glided through the Capitol amid the Great Recession. Known as the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, ...

Opinions

Bayard '24: In 2020, Trump grew his support among voters of color. Could that be a good thing?

By Augustus Bayard | January 22

In the ebullience, anguish and delusion that has followed President Joseph R. Biden’s win in the 2020 general election, one statistic seems inexplicable: Greater percentages of voters of color cast their ballot for former President Donald Trump in 2020 than in 2016. The question is simply: Why? I ...

Opinions

Pipatjarasgit ’21: The Office of International Programs somehow made my study abroad worse

By Poom Andrew Pipatjarasgit | January 21

In mid-October of 2020, I received an email from the Office of International Programs sent to all returned study abroad students, encouraging me to apply to work as a peer advisor. I laughed. Why would I ever want to work for OIP, or for that matter, interact with OIP ever again? Especially with the ...

Opinions

Apple '21: Republicans fall out of line

By Caleb Apple | January 20

With former President Donald Trump’s term as president finally at its end, many are now examining where the Republican Party, a party almost completely co-opted by Trump, can go from here. Republicans on Capitol Hill have discussed the need to move on from the Trump presidency, and Trump’s favorability ...

Opinions

Walsh '23: The savings disparity

By Matt Walsh | January 20

As joblessness claims have reached record highs during the pandemic, the ultra-rich have lined their pockets. By taking advantage of easy access to PPP loans, tax loopholes and the summer rebound in the stock market, the country’s billionaires have added more than $500 billion to their net worth. ...

Opinions

Shanmugam ’23: Building more schools alone won’t increase enrollment in low-income countries

By Arjun Shanmugam | January 19

In the world’s poorest countries, children who don’t attend school often have no choice but to become breadwinners — or even get married — before adulthood. For those who can stay in school, on the other hand, education is transformative. Just one additional year of schooling can boost future ...

Opinions

Editors’ Note: 2020 in review

By 131st Editorial Board | December 31

A year of loss that challenged everyone around the globe made no exception for the Brown community and The Herald’s own newsroom. In 2020, the nation faced a (still) raging pandemic and an economic recession, a racial reckoning that spurred the greatest civil rights movement in decades, hurricanes ...

Opinions

Pollard ’21: Brown can't make up for lost time but should support its students' futures

By Beth Pollard | November 23

As the University returns to COVID-19 Campus Activity Level 1, current students once again cannot access many of the campus resources that make a Brown education such an asset in the professional world. For those of us who never expected our last semesters at Brown to be taught remotely, entering the ...

Opinions

Apple '21: Dems, don’t back down on gun control

By Caleb Apple | November 22

Since the 2016 election, in which Trump overwhelmingly won rural white voters, a common question has been: How can Democrats win the white working-class and rural vote back? Traditionally the party of the working class, Democrats have become an increasingly urban and suburban party, and lost rural voters ...

Opinions

Shanmugam '23: Why the new administration's approach to China will make America safer, stronger and richer

By Arjun Shanmugam | November 22

In his tell-all book The Room Where It Happened, former National Security Advisor John Bolton reveals the chaos of the Trump administration’s inner circle. He also exposes an incoherent foreign policy towards China that conflicts with the narrative of hard-nosed toughness that the White House has ...

Opinions

Editors’ note: The Herald announces 131st Editorial Board

By 130th Editorial Board | November 20

The Herald is proud to announce the members of its 131st Editorial Board, who will oversee the paper through its 130th year. The 131st Editorial Board will be led by Editor-in-Chief and President Kayla Guo ’22, a Public Policy concentrator from Muttontown, New York. Henry Dawson ’22, a Biology ...

Opinions

Editorial: A Letter to the Class of 2024 in the Time of COVID-19

By Editorial Page Board | November 19

To incoming first-years: As you prepare to join our campus ranks in a semester like no other, we write to share words of wisdom (we hope) that may help guide you through the months ahead. When you were completing your applications last fall, we imagine none of you envisioned spending your first semester ...

Opinions

Hong ’24 and De Padova ’24: Reflections on First-Year Fall

By Jaehyun Hong | November 19

As the semester comes to a close, The Herald’s two first-year columnists look back on different aspects of their unconventional fall. Academics De Padova: Taking my first college class, a seminar on essay writing, completely online has left me wondering how different my experience was from an ...

Science & Research

Schmidt '21: Distrusting COVID-19 science is a disease in itself

By Rachael Schmidt | November 18

The immediate and negative effects of the COVID-19 pandemic are innumerable: serious illness, worsening mental health, economic downturn and more. But one of the most disastrous effects of the pandemic must not be overlooked: it has exacerbated already prevalent distrust in science and research. Tracing ...

Opinions

Ruzicka '21: Debunking common misconceptions about removing Roman-style statues at Brown

By Emilia Ruzicka | November 18

Recently, there has been a strong movement to remove Roman-style statues from Brown University’s campus. In February 2020, the group Decolonization at Brown (DAB) began their advocacy against the Public Art Committee’s (PAC) proposal to repair the arm of the Caesar Augustus statue that currently ...

Opinions

Bhaskar '21: Religion, controversy and the Supreme Court

By Nidhi Bhaskar | November 17

Following a turning point in American history, President-elect Joe Biden must prepare to enter an ideological arena that has been freshly impacted by the controversial appointment of Justice Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court, which created a 6-3 conservative-liberal majority. Amidst bipartisan ...