The Phillipian announc-es the results of the 2012 State of the Academy sur-vey, which is given annually to examine the demograph-ics of the student body and student opinions in a variety of categories. This year’s survey collected gen-eral information and sta-tistics about wellness, sex, drugs, academics, diversity and discipline.

706 students responded to the survey, representing 64 percent of the student body: 370 females and 331 males, 185 Seniors, 192 Up-pers, 175 Lowers and 149 Juniors.

This year’s State of the Academy survey intro-duced a “Campus Diver-sity” section, which asked for students’ opinions about Andover’s racial and socio-economic diversity.

88.3 percent of surveyed students thought that An-dover was diverse. 23 Afri-can-American and African students responded with this answer, comprising 67.6 percent of the African-

Americans and Africans who responded to the sur-vey.

A chi-square value was calculated to determine the statistical significance of the difference between the responses of African-Amer-icans and Africans and those of all surveyed stu-dents to this diversity ques-tion. The chi-square value is 14.038, indicating less than a 0.02 percent prob-ability that the difference in percentage of responses was due to chance.

Linda Griffith, Director of Community and Multi-cultural Development, said, “For me more than anything what this speaks to is that we need to have on-going conversations about how we [can] take advantage of the diversity on this cam-pus, because in compari-son to other Independent schools in America, we are diverse. Our numbers are. But if you’re coming from one of the lowest represent-ed groups, it doesn’t neces-sarily feel that way, so that’s critical.”

“When people are talk-ing about ‘diverse com-

munities,’ they often mean people of ‘color’ in the community. Coming from a black community, [Ando-ver] might be more diverse in that there are white stu-dents here, but you see a very dominant white field [at Andover],” said Griffith.

60.6 percent of surveyed students said that they thought there was a social divide between students of different races at Andover. 73.0 percent of surveyed Hispanic, African-Amer-ican and African students believe that such a social divide exists.

“The dominant [race] becomes the norm. So if you’re not a part of the dominant culture, whether it’s in race, whether it’s in class, then you’re more like-ly to feel the separation of it, the difference of it,” said Griffith.

“[The results] say that we’re not willing to take risks [to interact with those that are different from us], that it’s easier to stay in your comfort zone in the safety net of the people that you know, that you know what the language is,” she

continued.The survey results show

that most Andover students believe that there is a social divide between students of different socioeconomic backgrounds, as 70.3 per-cent of the surveyed stu-dents answered with this response.

More surveyed students identifying with lower so-cioeconomic classes believe that this divide exists than those from higher classes, according to the survey. The percentages of students from each socioeconomic class who believe that there is a divide between students of different socioeconomic backgrounds, from lower class to higher class, are 72.2 percent, 50.0 percent, 42.3 percent, 35.5 percent, 33.6 percent.

“If you are someone from a lower class at Ando-ver, imagine the alienation you feel here. This place is full of wealth, so if you’re someone who doesn’t iden-tify with that, it’s going to appear more divided. Many students who are of low in-come including our white students feel, I hear, more

of a sense of invisibility, when you’re not able to ac-cess certain things,” said Griffith.

She continued, “I would’ve thought more wealthy kids would have said ‘yes’ in acknowledge-ment that they are spending time amongst themselves, because I’ve heard some students say that it can be challenging when they want to take a college trip or a ski weekend, because they realize their friend can’t afford it, so they kind of avoid those invitations, and [people] unintention-

ally get excluded. In these cases, the kid on the lower class side feels the class di-vide, and the wealthier kid is very much aware of it.”

The survey revealed a small decrease in the num-ber of surveyed straight stu-dents, as 87.1 percent of sur-veyed students answered that they are straight, com-pared to 89 percent of stu-dents last year. Numbers for bisexual students and “unsure” students each rose from four percent to five percent.

A8 News T h e P h i l l i p i a n May18, 2012

State of the AcademyGeneral Info

5.1%

6.1%

6.4%

7.8%

International: 11.3%

Discontiguous U.S.: 11.3%

62.2%

International

11.7%International: 11.3%

Discontiguous US

0.6%

IS ANDOVER DIVERSE? RESPONSES BY RACE

SOCIOECONOMIC CLASS IDENTITY

STAFF REPORT

2012 Survey Introduces Campus Diversity Section

IS THERE A SOCIAL DIVIDE BETWEEN RACES?RESPONSES BY RACE

YES

70.3%

South Asian

Other

Middle Eastern

Hispanic

Caucasian

Asian-American/Asian

African-American/African

19.4%

5.1%3.6%

8.7%1.3%

4.6%

57.3%

Democratic Undecided Republican Independent Other

34.5%

28.4%

16.7%15.6%

4.8%

represents approx. 5%

HOME REgION RACE

POLITICAL AFFILIATION

African-American/African

Asian-American/Asian

Caucasian Hispanic South Asian

Yes No

IS THERE A SOCIAL DIVIDE BETWEEN CLASSES?RESPONSES BY SOCIOECONOMIC CLASS

ARE THERE CLIQUES AT ANDOVER?

DO YOU THINK THAT ANDOVERSTUDENTS ARE “NICE?”

67.6%

32.4%

IS ANDOVER DIVERSE?

DOES ANDOVER CONNECT STUDENTSOF DIFFERENT RACES AND CLASSES?

89.3%

10.7%

90.2%

9.8%

82.8%

17.2%

90.5%

9.5%

YES 88.3% NO11.7% NO

29.7%

YES

84.7%

NO

15.3%

YES

76.8%

NO

23.2%

67.6%

32.4%

61.5%

38.5%

57.4%

42.6%

79.3%

20.7%

71.4%

28.6%

72.2%

27.8%

50.0% 50.0%

42.3%

57.7%

35.5%

64.5%

33.6%

66.4%

Asian-American/

Asian

African-American/

African

Caucasian Hispanic South Asian Lower Class Lower MiddleClass

UpperMiddleClass

MiddleClass

UpperClass

Yes NoYes No

Agnosticism

Atheism

Buddhism

Christianity

Hinduism

Judaism

Islam

Other

RELIgION16.0%

18.7%

2.9%

38.9%

3.0%

1.6%

8.1%

10.8%

Graphics by Jing Qu

Lower Middle

UpperMiddle

Middle UpperLower

Out of 701 responses

Out of 701 responses

Out of 693 responses

22.0%

42.2%

25.5%

7.4%2.9%

Out of 701 responses

Out of 701 responses

Out of 701 responses

Out of 626 responses Out of 626 responses