We appeared in our second Brown Daily Herald story of the week today. This story focused on perceptions of Brown and we spoke to the issue of how intellectually diverse the University is. Here is more:

A 2006 article by Herald Opinions Columnist Sean Quigley ’10 in the Brown Spectator, Brown’s publication for conservative and libertarian views, called the post-O’Reilly iteration of the party “an abomination, whose justification is an affront to logical reasoning, let alone spiritual well-being.”

In recent years, conservative students and alumni have vocalized criticism of Brown as a particularly left-leaning institution.

Stephen Beale ’04, who started the Spectator in fall 2002, formed the Foundation for Intellectual Diversity after encountering difficulty funding the Spectator as a student organization. A non-profit dedicated to promoting “underrepresented ideas, beliefs and perspectives” at Brown, the foundation provides money and assistance to conservative and religious student groups, according to its Web site.

“The most important kind of diversity on college campuses is intellectual diversity and so when you’re talking about other forms of diversity — racial diversity, ethnic diversity, sexual diversity — Brown may do very well,” Beale said. “But when you talk about intellectual diversity, that is something that Brown is very much lacking in.”

One “encouraging development,” according to Beale, is the Kaleidoscope Lecture Fund, which Beale said was started after members of the foundation discussed a perceived lack of diversity in campus speakers with President Ruth Simmons.

The fund is used to bring speakers that “in the stereotypical view are seen as being ‘not Brown,’ ” said Assistant to the President Hannelore Rodriguez-Farrar ’87 MA’90 PhD’09.
Started in 2005, the fund was originally constituted with $100,000 of the president’s discretionary funds. Past Kaleidoscope speakers include Sally Winn, then vice president of Feminists for Life of America; Peter Singer, a Princeton professor who is vocal on animal rights issues; and diplomats John Bolton and Richard Holbrooke ’62.

“What we need to do is fulfill our mission,” Rodriguez-Farrar said. “Part of that mission is intellectual diversity.”

Click here to read the whole article.

FID President Stephen Beale was quoted in a Brown Daily Herald story today about President Ruth Simmons. Below are excerpts:

Stephen Beale ’04, co-founder of the Foundation for Intellectual Diversity — a non-profit that funds the Brown Spectator and brings speakers to campus — said Simmons’ resignation from the Goldman Sachs board “shows that she puts her ideological principles above pragmatism.” Her commitment to her values may be the reason why there was so little backlash, he said.

Though he is concerned about the University’s promotion of “left-wing” issues, Beale spoke positively about Simmons herself. “I think President Simmons is charismatic and inspirational,” he said, adding that she is “very diplomatic about how she presents her views” and “extends olive branches to other groups.”

Click here to read the whole story.

The Associated Press reports on a planned protest of the decision to cancel Columbus Day at Brown University:

Brown Students Protest Renaming of Columbus Day

By Associated Press
Monday, October 12, 2009

PROVIDENCE, R.I. — A decision to strip Columbus Day from the Brown University calendar because of the explorer’s violence against Native Americans sparks a protest at the Ivy League school.

A group of student Republicans are planning a protest Friday afternoon to object to the university’s decision to rename the holiday “Fall Weekend.”

Keith Dellagrotta, a Brown senior who leads the school’s College Republicans club, described the decision as political correctness gone too far. He said Columbus should be celebrated for bringing the European political tradition to the New World, which led to the foundation of the United States.

Hundreds of Brown students asked the Providence school to stop observing Columbus Day because of atrocities committed against American Indians.

This story is being picked up by media. For the Channel 12 report click here. The above article does not mention it, but in addition to the College Republicans, students from the Brown Spectator, which the Foundation for Intellectual Diversity funds, also are involved in organizing the rally. The event, which is scheduled for noon to 2 p.m. today on the Main Green, is being organized by local talk radio host John DePetro. Check back here later for updates.

Subsequent to yesterday’s press release, the Providence Journal today published a short feature about the Foundation.

01:00 AM EDT on Friday, October 9, 2009

By Richard C. Dujardin

Journal Staff Writer PROVIDENCE — The Foundation for Intellectual Diversity has assailed Brown University’s hiring of a Nigerian author who the group says is known for denouncing British author Joseph Conrad as a “bloody racist” and says Brown should “rethink” its plans to expand its Africana studies program.

“It is unfortunate that Brown continues to buy into this empty notion of diversity based on race, sex and ethnicity,” said Stephen Beale, the foundation’s president.

A 2004 graduate, Beale said the foundation’s board of directors is made up of Brown graduates who would like to see more intellectual diversity at Brown and other college campuses.

He said the hiring of Nigeria writer Chinua Achebe to the faculty of the Africana studies department was aggravating because Achebe, besides calling Conrad a racist, claimed that Conrad’s book Heart of Darkness celebrates the dehumanization and depersonalization of African people.

“We urge the university to consider more creative ways to teach its students about the classics of Western literature than calling them racist. Students deserve to appreciate great books on their own merits without having them cut down into caricatures of European colonialism.”

During the last two days, calls to Brown’s Africana studies department and to the assistant to the president for a reaction to the foundation’s criticisms were not returned.

The Web site for the Foundation for Intellectual Diversity is idiversity.org