Early involvement
From the start of her time at Amherst, Brown had a good understanding of how quickly her years as an undergraduate student would pass by; thus, she spent her four years here making sure every moment was well spent. As a first-year, Brown became an active member of the Amherst Feminist Alliance. Her eagerness to become involved in campus activities led her to participate in the "Vagina Monologues." But her most distinguished accomplishment during her freshman year was her involvement in an organization known as FACE (Financial Aid Class Equality), which aimed both to educate the student body about poverty rights and to inform the community about those obstacles that often come with low socioeconomic status. Brown become co-chair of FACE her sophomore year, and she made it a priority to organize a forum in which students receiving financial aid could ask any questions they had about studying abroad.
In her junior year, Brown corralled a group of her friends to start the Amherst College Voting Initiative. The group's main goal was to get students registered to vote in time for the 2004 Democratic primaries. During last November's presidential election, the organization continued its efforts to help students become responsible voters. Brown claimed that her reasons for starting the group stemmed from a disappointment in the general political apathy of the student body. "I was just so frustrated with students not being engaged politically. I felt like I had to do something," she said.
Original research
Some of Brown's most notable work has come in her final year at Amherst as she engaged in innovative research for her sociology thesis. Her thesis, which provides a unique insight into minority race relations, focuses on the reaction of black communities to Mexican immigration. Brown's objective was to find out if these two minority groups had any potential to band together politically. From her thesis, Brown learned a variety of useful lessons about how people perceive minority groups in the U.S. "I think one of the main issues I wanted to address in my thesis was the tendency to homogenize and marginalize minority groups," she said. "We assume that if two groups are marginalized they will get along, and that is not the case. I wanted to draw out the ways that dominant public discourse racializes and excludes people by attaching certain meanings to seemingly neutral categories. ... I have often felt like race studies rely too heavily on the black versus white dichotomy and increasingly, on the color line that exists between whites and non-whites.
Brown continued, "I think people understand that minorities do not necessarily get along. A lot of people talk about the conflict between Korean shop owners and blacks in cities like L.A. and New York. It is important to challenge the assumption that minority groups will work together simply because of their racial background. Studying black-Mexican immigrant relations clarified many of the issues behind the conflicts that exist between the two groups, and it also illuminated many areas where the two groups could work together."
Coming up with such an original topic for a thesis was easy for Brown: the idea fell into her lap. When she was home for break an article came out in her local newspaper about one of the local public schools. Accompanying the article was a picture of a teacher in her classroom; however, a Mexican flag could clearly be seen hanging on the wall in the background. This outraged Brown's local community so much that it led Brown to wonder about the black community's reaction to this particular situation.
Thus, she got the idea to focus her thesis on race studies between minority groups. "In taking race studies I found that too much focuses on black versus white or Hispanic versus white, and I wanted to do something that focuses on relations between these minority groups because it is an issue that is not addressed often enough," she said.
Moving on
Brown leaves college with no regrets about her decision to attend such a small liberal arts school so far from home. "I am a lot different because of this place. I think that academically I have learned so much," she said. "I doubt I would have had a chance to know my professors as well as I did had I gone to another school." Brown admits it will not be easy to leave the place she has grown so accustomed to, but she knows she is ready to embark on the next phase of life's journey. "I have had a lot of memorable moments. I am sad to leave my friends, but I am ready to move on."
Brown has aspirations of continuing her education after graduating. She plans to attend either law school or graduate school in sociology or public relations.