CENTER FOR THE STUDY OF SLAVERY AND JUSTICE
A Place to Learn
RECOMMENDATIONS FROM THE REPORT
BROWN UNIVERSITY'S RESPONSE TO THE REPORT
REVISE OFFICIAL HISTORY
​The University will commission a revision of its official history so that it presents a more complete picture of the origins of Brown.
PUBLICIZE THE REPORT
​The University will disseminate the report and make it accessible to anyone upon request in a variety of media including Web, print, and CD/DVD free of charge.
ARCHIVING THE COMMITTEE'S RESEARCH AND WORK
​The relevant materials used in preparation of the report will be held in the University’s permanent archives. The University will ensure that its libraries and museums will have the resources to make the materials available to scholars and to present them to the public in exhibitions from time to time.
PUBLIC MEMORIALS
The University will work with representatives of the City of Providence and the State of Rhode Island to form a commission that will develop ideas for how the history of slavery and the slave trade in Rhode Island may gain its appropriate and permanent place in the public historical record.
ESTABLISHING MAJOR RESEARCH AND TEACHING INITIATIVE ON SLAVERY AND JUSTICE
Through existing departments, centers, and institutes or through creation of a new academic entity, the University’s Corporation, administration, and faculty will undertake a major research and teaching initiative on slavery and justice.Whether this results in a new center or the significant enlargement of an existing and coordinated set of programs should be determined through this process.
STRENGTHEN AND SUPPORT AFRICANA STUDIES DEPARTMENT
​The University will take steps to strengthen and expand the Department of Africana Studies. A team of outside experts in the field will be appointed to asses the existing program and make recommendations for its improvement, including the department’s facilities.
STRENGTHEN BROWN-TOUGALOOÂ PARTNERSHIP
The University will strengthen and expand its program with Tougaloo College under the aegis of the Advisory Council on Relations with Tougaloo College.
PROVIDE SUPPORT TO HISTORICALLY BLACK COLLEGES AND UNIVERSITIES
The University will continue its program of providing technical assistance to Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs). Begun in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, Brown will expand this program to include other HBCU institutions and invite additional universities to assist in this effort by providing academic and administrative consultants to support strategic and financial planning, academic oversight, administrative review, governance revisions and assessments, and other needs as defined by HBCU boards of trustees and presidents.
The University also affirms its historical and continuing commitment to contribute in meaningful ways to the health of the Providence and Rhode Island communities, especially its public K-12 schools. Because there is little in the broader society that correlates as closely to the University’s own mission as elementary and secondary education, and because access to education is essential in a just and equitable society,
ADDITIONAL COMMITMENTS
The University will raise a permanent endowment in the amount of $10 million to establish a Fund for the Education of the Children of Providence. The endowment will be overseen by the Corporation of Brown University, and allocation of funds from the endowment will be determined by the University with input from the Superintendent of Providence Schools.
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The University will provide free tuition to as many as 10 admitted graduate students per year who, after successful completion of a master’s degree in teaching or a master’s degree in urban education policy, agree to serve in Providence-areas schools or surrounding area schools for a minimum of three years.
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The University will continue its support for the Providence public schools through an array of programs, including a position in the Office of the Superintendent of Providence Schools, for professional development of teachers, for curriculum development, for mentoring and tutoring of students, for gifts of equipment, and for other activities in support of schools and teachers.
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The University will engage an outside consultant to evaluate the effectiveness of new and ongoing programs of support for the schools.
WHAT WORK STILL NEEDS TO BE DONE
In response to the recommendations from the Report, Brown University committed to 12 action items. While the University published an update on its progress towards these items in 2011, much more still has yet to be done to fulfill the recommendations outlined in the original Report. Of note, the institution only chose 12 action items from the larger list of recommendations from the Report listed above. What work do you notice still has yet to be done?
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The 2006 Report failed to mention the ways in which Brown University benefitted from the forced removal of Wampanoag and Narragansett Peoples. Settler colonialism and genocide created the context in which slavery occurred. Racial slavery was central to the emergence and growth of the economic system of capitalism. These systems laid the foundation for the United States to establish itself as a slave society—a society where slavery was central to everyday life. The United States could not build an economy from the labor of enslaved people without enacting violence on the Native Peoples of this land. The confrontations between Native Peoples and English colonizers in what is now New England laid the groundwork for our understanding of the ways in which slavery permeated every aspect of society in Rhode Island and early America.
Today it is critical to think about the ways that the University must acknowledge this history as part of its legacy and increase representation of and dedicate greater resources to Black and Native faculty and students. Brown University must take serious conversations and solutions towards reparative justice and begin to reconsider its collecting, particularly of sacred belongings of the Narragansett and Wampanoag Peoples.
