If you or someone you know is a member of the Brown Class of 1976, please contact brown2026democracy@brown.edu to get involved.
Edited Excerpt: Nancy Leopold ’76
Nancy Leopold '76: "I took full advantage of the new curriculum. I took stuff that hadn't been in my wheelhouse or was new to me. And I did it, you know, knowing that I could, that I could… I did everything. I did English literature classes. I did biology -- not my thing, but it was great. I did a bit of sciences. I did a fair number of social sciences…
Women were aware that our opportunities might be shaved a little or expectations might be lower or, you know, it wasn't 'we were women hear us roar.' You know, we were very much, we thought of ourselves as sort of part of the vanguard. But in fact, we were really standing on the shoulders of some women who had done the hard work…
The Class of 1976 were vibrant and engaged. I also think that there were, at that time, assumptions that it was our job not to just do well, but to do good. That could take many forms... But even if you were going into traditional fields, you know, law, engineering, whatever, that there was this sort of extra responsibility…
We lived in a democracy, and we valued that, and we understood that freedoms of speech and assembly and all sorts of things had been, you know, important to us.”
Edited Excerpt: Jill Grigsby ’76 (March 2026)
Jill Grigsby '76: "I happened to be on the swim team when Title IX passed. That was so important because I saw the transition from women's sports being almost nothing. I mean, like not getting almost no funding to being not equivalent to men's sports but getting there. So, we had our own uniforms... We each got our own bathing suit. We didn't get the team's suits from the previous year. And we had warm-up suits, and we could go to meets and we could stay in a hotel, that kind of thing that we didn't get before Title IX
Our class was the first group of 18-year-olds to be able to vote in a national election. We were very politically active because we were 18-year-olds and we wanted to vote...We, the freshmen, could vote! And I think it was exciting too to be in a state, a very small state, where people running for Congress and running for the Senate, you could touch them. You could go see them…
The forefathers or the people who led the country were really about the local as much as the national. And so, I see the bicentennial as really a way of also celebrating the local and celebrating how America fits in the global world as well. I try to think about America as part of a global network, but also that it's important to be local too…
The truth is that the happiest years of my life were my four years at Brown. I really enjoyed being a college student. So, in many ways, teaching at a college has been a way to kind of recreate my happiest years of my life."
Edited Excerpt: Neil Bennett ’76 (March 2026)
Neil Bennett ’76: “ We went through a textbook, like almost a mathematical textbook, you know, dealing with population matters. And at the end of the course, I said, I really like this stuff. Do you think I can have an independent study with you for the next semester. Maybe we can complete the textbook. And he said to me, no, I'm not really interested in that. And of course, my heart fell. And then he said, but you know, I could really use an RA and we could call that a course. And I thought, okay I’ve died and gone to heaven okay because this is a thousand times better than what I was suggesting you know, so I was his right-hand kind of useless guy helping him out, but it was a great experience and ultimately, I helped him work on this article and he published it. And then when it was published, I looked at it and I said, oh, my God, he has my name in the acknowledgments. So, I thought, OK, lightning has struck twice. I have died twice and gone to heaven.”
Edited Excerpt: Sue Hagerman ’76 (February 2026)
Sue Hagerman ’76: "I had great classes, and I also took a bunch of things that weren't in either of my fields. And that was the beauty of them -- to be able to take Econ 101 for pass fail and a course in Dostoevsky and a women's studies class and poultry and science and just the whole gamut. I was very sad, taking the last four courses of my senior year because there were so many wonderful things that I hadn't had a chance to explore…
I think Brown allowed me to grow into myself and to do that without limits and with the ability to make all kinds of mistakes, personal and academic... Really, they treated us like grownups and expected us to act like we were in charge of ourselves. And that was an incredible gift. You could be whoever, we had great sportsmen and you could be whoever you wanted to be. So, explore anything. And I think I was just so grateful to have gone there and to have found the people that I found. And I don't regret a single thing about going. That's really it. That's a key part of my identity."
Edited Excerpt: Nancy Neff ’76 (February 2026)
Nancy Neff: ’76: “There were four varsity women's teams in 1972, and tennis was one, basketball was not one. There were a couple of games, and I think the entire budget was about $15,000 for all of women's athletics. I went to the women's athletics director and said, this really seems kind of meager for a major university. My high school had a better program than this. And she said, yeah, you're right, but you're a freshman and this is what it is here. And the facilities were not very good. You know, there were many, you used the gyms that were on the Pembroke campus. They were small. Tennis practice occurred when it occurred, but it was not impressive. We'll put it that way. And very poor compared to what was being offered for the men.
Things changed dramatically from my freshman year to my sophomore year. Suddenly went from four teams to 13 varsity teams. We had a budget, it sounds small now, but it was a big change to over $100,000. And suddenly we had, like, real schedules and travel. And so, although clearly not what the men had, there was a big change.”
Edited Excerpt: Bob Tracy ’76 (February 2026)
Bob Tracy ’76: “I decided to be an Econ major, and it was a challenging major for a lot of people, but I liked it so much that I think it made it easier for me. And I liked the idea that, you know, I'd go to class every day and I do the reading, which was not, you know, you didn't have to read a book for every class like you would with history, but you'd have to read maybe 30 pages a night and you'd really have to concentrate on it. And I liked that and going to class and taking tests rather than having to do papers where you had to get a million sources, I was never big on that. I was never big on typing papers. In those days, you know, you had a typewriter. If you made a mistake, you had to start all over again.”
Edited Excerpt: Harry Sparks ’76 (February 2026)
Harry Sparks ’76: "At the beginning of my senior year, I changed my major, which was a testament to the open curriculum. And it was interesting. I looked at what I had been taking and what I wanted to take and decided that I was more interested in computer science than in applied math. And I went to the applied math department, which shared space in the applied math building, which was a house on, I think it was on George Street. I went in to see Andy Van Dam, who was a professor in charge of computer science at the time…
I suppose that [partial credit] is worth making the effort because if professors and teachers are open-minded, they will give you some credit for making the effort and for getting some things correct, even if you don't have it correct all the way. And I suppose I hadn't really thought about it much, but I think there's also effort once you're out of school in life and trying to do things, even if they don't always wind up the way you expect them to…
If you're going to go to Brown, take advantage of the opportunities. Like I said before, don't take all your courses in one field. Use the opportunity to experiment and try some things just because you'll maybe find something that you love, something that could be a hobby or maybe something that would be a career you hadn't thought of. And take advantage of the opportunity. Use the resources, make some good friends."
Edited Excerpt: Susan Mazonson ’76 (November 2025)
Susan Mazonson ’76: “My cousin told me, you must apply to Ivy’s, and I said, no, that’s not for me. And then a couple of people I knew in my high school were here already. I went to visit, and it was love at first sight. And I saw the philosophy, the new curriculum by then, we still call it the new curriculum, it’s now called the open curriculum, was just really getting going. And it was just amazing. I’m feeling chills as I think about it. It was just such an exceptional opportunity. And I feel just incredibly fortunate. I’m sure my sentiments are echoed by many, many of my classmates and others that I know from Brown…”
Michael Zhu ’26: “What were the early years of the open curriculum like for you?”
Susan Mazonson ’76: “My gosh, I felt like you did, Michael… 50 years later, still the same feeling. Right? It’s really, I just wanted to take everything. I was a kid in a candy store. I was like, what do I do? The book, we had to go through a book, you know, a very thick book. And I just, I kind of went with my gut. I don’t remember researching that much about what courses to take the way I would do it now. I just knew I wanted a broad-based experience. I was really excited about the modes of thought courses, I don’t know they still call it that for freshmen, sophomores, that was part of the new curriculum. And I keep seeing now, it’s called the open curriculum now. But the modes of thought were interdisciplinary classes, well, interdisciplinary themes. And I felt that I was all about that then. And I am more so now.”
Edited Excerpt: Professor Emeritus Gordon Wood (October 2025)
Professor Emeritus Gordon Wood: “Rhode Island’s state history is extraordinary. When you think about it, we were the first state to declare independence. We had a charter from the Crown, and we just crossed out every reference to the King. So, we were the first state to sort of declare independence in that sense. That’s in May [1776], it’s not until July we get the Declaration. And then we were the last state of the thirteen to sign the Constitution.
I think you could have an interesting discussion with students and say, well, how come? How come we were the first and yet the last to sign the Constitution? I mean, we waited two years, until 1790. I mean, and we had to be really pressured into it. Providence threatened to leave the state. Join now, become independent, or join Massachusetts, or something, so they were upset at the rest of the state not willing to sign the Constitution and join up with the rest of the nation.
It’s an interesting state. I mean, the 17th century is just incredible. We know the whole colonial period had five capitals, five capitals we moved from, you know, so they could rotate because the localism was so strong. They were so jealous of each other. We had Newport, Providence, Bristol, Kingston, and one other somewhere in Narraganset. Of course, we had no religious establishment and had someone like Roger Williams, really anticipating, although not in the modern sense, the separation of church and state.”