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Brown University recently announced its plans to combat the school’s systemic issues by doing the bare minimum.
“Brown has always committed itself to the ideals of equality and justice, and today we honor that commitment by doing as little as we can get away with,” said President Christina Paxson in an address from the steps of Faunce House.
Paxson said the new plan comes after University Administrators spent a small amount of time listening to student concerns and realized that some token amount of change was necessary moving forward in order to adequately placate concerns of exclusion and get everyone to stop hassling them.
“It’s a purely symbolic plan that we hope will revolutionize how the University appears to work on the surface level but will enact minimal change on an institutional level,” said Paxson.
Paxson rolled out the new strategic plan in an email to students entitled “Where We Are Going.” The 68 page document linked in the email cited numerous student concerns in the most vague, unspecific terms possible. As a result of the negative feedback, the University will begin offering “open communication channels,” where students can participate directly in administrative discussions that will be unable to shake the institutional culture of the school but whose participants will be used in media campaigns highlighting the school’s modicum of effort.
“Right now our University is at a real turning point. We wanted to make sure that going forward we have the appearance of being a force for good,” said Paxson.
Groups of students at Brown reported that they feel isolated due to their class or cultural upbringing, which Paxson insisted will change with the construction of new study spaces on campus that feature an open floor plan, and a big ugly building somewhere down in the Fox Point neighborhood.
Dean of Students Maude Mandel said the University Administration’s part in pretending to solve these problems is complete, and now it will be up to academic departments to either address systemic problems or not, depending on the makeup of their faculties.
“Students demanded that we change our hiring processes to become more inclusive,” Mandel said. “So we decided to pass that problem on.”
At press time, the University announced plans to build three new Schools of Engineering.
