Brown University student Kevin Ross ’09 writes about his semester at Jerry Falwell’s Liberty University:
I did start to see that Liberty and Brown shared some unexpected similarities. Both schools produce young idealists who are both passionate about changing the world and more likely than not to act on that passion. Both foster academic life outside the classroom; on any given night in my Liberty dorm, you could find a dozen guys talking about the Reformation, hashing out complex theories of salvation, or debating the timing of Christ’s Second Coming. Both schools are at their best when they cultivate real critical thinking and challenge conventional wisdom, and at their worst when they ostracize those who don’t fit the mold.
And, most importantly, neither school is as homogenous as it seems from the outside. Just as Brown’s reputation for left-wing hedonism fails to take into account its non-partiers, its religious groups, and its chapter of the Brown Republicans, Liberty has its share of people you wouldn’t expect to find at Jerry Falwell’s college: doubters, skeptics, even a few Obama supporters.
Read it all in the Brown Alumni Monthly.