Class president for two years brings an interesting
perspective on her undergraduate years
At the mention of her Duke undergraduate years, Lindsay Brown, Trinity '98, hesitates at first and then observes how far away those days seemed.
After another moment of reflection, Brown begins to sift through the memories of her college years, when the basketball championships ran dry and President Nan Keohane was just settling into her new position.
As the junior and senior class president in 1997 and 1998, respectively, Brown has an interesting perspective on her time at Duke and in particular how things changed during Keohane's first few years.
"It was interesting, a little bit of a transition period because [my freshman year] was the last year before East was a freshmen campus," Brown says. Moving all freshmen onto East Campus was not the only major change the class of '98 and those classes just before and after witnessed. Brown says there were many social changes that caused considerable discussion among students and administrators.
"I think for the students, the big change was the alcohol policy, which was very controversial. A lot of the social life moving off campus was also very controversial," she remembers.
"Basketball bonfires were outlawed and then, after much protest, were brought back. We went from beer on points and [weekend] campus parties--Friday night was East Campus, Saturday night was West--to a crackdown on alcohol..., which moved the social life on campus to off," Brown says.
She adds that the mid-1990s saw the last of the legendary "Pike's Peak" parties, and basketball coach Mike Krzyzewski's back injury, causing him to sit out for much of the season.
Although the move of social life off campus was unwelcome, there were many changes that received positive feedback. Brown says it was a lot of fun for the incoming freshmen because they were all together on East.
"It was a positive experience. I think [moving all freshmen to East Campus] was a great idea, it worked really well," Brown says. "It was also a transition to sophomores in Trent, [which] was a little controversial."
Although Brown never lived in Trent, she reflects fondly on her classmates who she says were the first to "call Trent home."
"Words like 'WEL' weren't in our vocabulary," she jokes.
Although Brown had a great experience as the class president of both her junior and senior class, she decided not to pursue a political career and instead became a New York attorney, focusing on commercial real estate.
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