Community
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| BRandeis Students forge a special sense of community by organizing, participating in and leading student groups devoted to social action. |
As a small, residential university, students, faculty and staff at Brandeis who share common interests inevitably share common experiences. In classes, in cocurricular activities on and off campus, and in social action beyond the campus, students intent on using their knowledge and skills to make the world a better place come to share a sense of community with one another, and with the faculty and university staff who share their commitment to social justice.
Students forge a special sense of community by organizing, participating in and leading student groups devoted to social action. And they exercise the skills of active citizenship through student government and university administration.
Students regularly participate in university committees alongside faculty and staff, and contribute to ongoing efforts to maintain the vitality of our shared community. The Brandeis community is open and inclusive, not only toward the outside world, but toward each other.
OPPORTUNITY
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| Brandeis students are motivated by concern for issues of justice in public life. |
The great variety of course offerings and programs in the social sciences and humanities afford students opportunities to study issues of public life from a variety of perspectives, both in the classroom and beyond.
Sociology, psychology, politics and other departments and programs each offer courses that engage fundamental questions of equality and inequality in health, wealth, status and power. The role of gender in shaping societal relations is central to the offerings of the Women’s and Gender Studies Program. Programs in Legal Studies, business, and health and social policy address issues of social responsibility.
Brandeis students motivated by concern for issues of justice in public life, working with faculty advisors engaged in teaching, researching, writing, and real-world action, often combine majors and minors to create courses of study that prepare them not only for the world of work, but for a life of active citizenship in support of more just outcomes in public life.
JUSTICE
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| As an Ethics Center Student Fellow, Hannah Janoowalla '10 worked on AIDS prevention initiatives with sex workers in Mumbai, India. |
Concern for social justice is integral to the study of public life. Students and faculty bring the lessons learned from their experiences in the real world back to the classroom, enriching intellectual discourse and strengthening the scholarship they produce. Many of our courses, and much of the research and writing of our faculty is inspired by their involvement in social action – from community organizations in Boston, to international NGOs engaged in conflict management.
Students pursue their commitment to social justice through experiential learning opportunities, through participation in campus organizations, by taking leadership roles in nationally-prominent organizations, and by founding new national organizations of their own.
Faculty and students alike start from strong foundations in social scientific and humanistic study. The liberal arts curriculum at Brandeis empowers students intent on social action with the knowledge base and analytical skills they need to grapple with the complex social problems that mobilize them to act.