You do not have to be a major in marketing or, in fact, a college student to know this self-evident truth about Brandeis—Brandeis public relations does not exist. There is no better example of this than the fact that the statue of Louis Brandeis does not have a mask on. For God’s sake Brandeis, what are you thinking? That the millions of stickers on the ground that students walk over and don’t pay attention to work? You think spray painting a yellow phrase at the entrance of campus gets the message across?

This lack of awareness became evident to me when I pointed it out to a first year I was walking with from Gosman. He looked at it after I pointed it out, and he told me that he never knew it was there, not to mention that it was COVID-19-related. For those who do not know what it says, as you drive onto campus the impossible-to-see yellow sign says, “Get Inspired Mask Required.” So, strike one Brandeis on COVID-19 PR: Your spray painting of a yellow sign that no one sees is just as good as not buying all that paint. 

I am just imagining how the meeting went down between the administration when they were planning how to put signs all around campus to remind us that we need to keep a mask on. “First on the docket: We need a sign at the entrance of campus. Anyone have an idea on it?” “Yeah, I was thinking, and get this, we paint a phrase only a soccer mom would find inspiring and that you can’t see unless you happen to be 20 feet above the ground, which will be a very easy height to get to when your soul leaves your body after being hit by the zooming BranVans.” 

“But it doesn’t stop there. The sign is so pointless that we will have to rent an electric traffic sign to get the point across. So really, we do not even need the paint, but why not overdo it in all the wrong places. We are Brandeis after all.” 

From there whoever proposed the painting idea probably was awarded some medal by the university for their genius in PR. Then as the meeting continued, the administration, thinking there could be no better idea than the painting one, must have been shocked when someone brought up the sticker idea. 

Let’s be honest, no one reads the stickers. We are Brandeis students: Between our two majors and three minors, we do not have enough time to read some sticker on the ground. Look, Brandeis, we spent three hours last night having an anxiety attack about all our work wondering if all the majors are what we really want to do. Then when we realized after our panic attack that we had to get work done anyway, we grinded it out. So we do not have time for your little stickers that tell us class is not cancelled. We know it’s not cancelled; we just cried about it a second ago. So, strike two for Brandeis PR because the stickers do not work unless the students read them. 

But to even it all out, if you want to decorate your dorm room walls in East, you can take your own sticker! Just go to Chapels Pond and grab one of those suckers from the ground; they aren’t stuck on, so grab as many as you want and really make your walls stand out! I know; I have five of my own, so you better get yours before they run out!

So now we arrive at strike three, Brandeis. How did you miss this one? It’s just so simple and obvious: Put a mask on the Brandeis statue! We all walk around it and look at it, so what easier way to remind us to wear a mask? Statues all over the country have had masks put on them, so I do not know how that idea slipped your minds, you guys. The Statue of Liberty has one on! No, not the famous one in NYC but the just as cool one in Las Vegas has a mask on her face.

Making it even easier for the Brandeis statue, you do not even need a special mask for him. I am sure you could easily modify a disposable mask to fit onto him. Students, and I will admit including myself, have put the cone on him in so many different places that the effort it has required staff to remove the cone triumphs that of making a mask. I do love this school, so, Brandeis admin, let’s make a deal right here: I can sew Brandeis his own mask that will fit his face perfectly. The fabric should cost no more than $10, and my labor would maybe take two hours, meaning that if I charged a little over minimum wage for my two hours of work and for the fabric, it would cost $40 for me to sew the mask. 

But Brandeis, because I love you, I will only charge you $65. I know that deal doesn’t make sense, but I do not know any better—I am just copying Brandeis’ PR strategies.