Editorial
Some Food for Thought
By The Phillipian Editorial Board Cxxxii
Published on October 26, 2009 in CXXXII no. 19How would you define “Andover”?
By the Numbers:
Year founded: 1778. Total enrollment: 1,108. Teaching faculty: 223. Average class size: 13.0. Countries represented: 34. Average SAT: 2076. Time here for four-year student: 12,096,000 seconds. Snow Days: 0. By the Pros:
The academic rigor. The diversity. Hardworking teachers and students. The transformative personal independence. Cheering at the top of your lungs because someone is waving a battered field hockey stick. Blue gummy sharks. Finding a calling, a specialty, a passion.
By the Cons:
The cost of tuition. The stress. The distance from family and friends back home. The fatigue.
To Phillips Academy Parents:
We would like to extend a warm welcome as you return to campus for Parents’ Weekend. A lot has transpired here since school commenced. Juniors and Lowers have campaigned for positions in Student Council. The entire student body participated in this year’s Non Sibi Day community service projects. Midterms have whizzed by...
Some Food for Thought
By The Phillipian Editorial Board Cxxxii
Published on October 26, 2009 in CXXXII no. 19How would you define “Andover”?
By the Numbers:
Year founded: 1778. Total enrollment: 1,108. Teaching faculty: 223. Average class size: 13.0. Countries represented: 34. Average SAT: 2076. Time here for four-year student: 12,096,000 seconds. Snow Days: 0. By the Pros:
The academic rigor. The diversity. Hardworking teachers and students. The transformative personal independence. Cheering at the top of your lungs because someone is waving a battered field hockey stick. Blue gummy sharks. Finding a calling, a specialty, a passion.
By the Cons:
The cost of tuition. The stress. The distance from family and friends back home. The fatigue.
To Phillips Academy Parents:
We would like to extend a warm welcome as you return to campus for Parents’ Weekend. A lot has transpired here since school commenced. Juniors and Lowers have campaigned for positions in Student Council. The entire student body participated in this year’s Non Sibi Day community service projects. Midterms have whizzed by...
Due Discourse
By Phillipian Editorial Board Cxxxii
Published on October 15, 2009 in CXXXII no. 18Since Paul Murphy began his term as Dean of Students, he has sought to institute some controversial changes related to student life. Most recently, Murphy decided to cancel the team skits at pep rallies before consulting with students. He later retracted his decision after holding a meeting with Blue Key Heads and the Athletic Advisory Board, which consists of varsity team captains. Team skits will not be cancelled for this term’s Andover/Exeter pep rally. Instead, they will be screened for appropriateness. This solution is a fair compromise addressing the concerns of offensive skits, but the method in which Murphy made his decision raises questions.
Though concern over the pep rally skits was legitimate—the Boys Hockey skit is still fresh in the memory of some offended students, parents and teachers—the solution he initially decided upon came about without due discourse.
Last Wednesday, Murphy met with Blue Key Heads and the...
A Voluntary Non Sibi Day
By The Phillipian Editorial Board Cxxxii
Published on October 10, 2009 in CXXXII no. 17Non Sibi Day serves many purposes. It fosters a sense of community, exposes students to community service at Andover, promotes the spirit of “non sibi” and, of course, provides a service to the broader community. But these purposes would be better served if Non Sibi Day was made mandatory for new students and voluntary for returning students. Mandating service runs contrary to Andover’s values and fosters a sense of resentment among some students.
The Non Sibi Day mentality is “not for self,” but some students show up solely to avoid getting a cut for the day. Chad Green, NSD Coordinator and Community Service Director, said he agreed that mandatory volunteerism does not fit the independent nature of students. Certain students harbor negative attitudes that detract from a group’s enthusiasm and energy. While these students fulfill their service requirement, it is not in the intended spirit of the day....
Our Money Is In Good Hands
By The Phillipian Editorial Board CXXXII
Published on October 2, 2009 in CXXXII no. 16We should be thankful. In an email sent to faculty and staff
on academy financial updates, Barbara Chase, Head of School,
announced that our endowment, once valued at $803.5 million
during its highest point in June 2007, has declined to its present
value of $641.8 million.
This decline may seem drastic. But, in comparison to our
peer schools, Andover is well-off. PA’s endowment investment
fell 15 percent, a pleasant suprise after the administration’s initial
estimates of a 22 percent decline last winter. Meanwhile, The
Phillipian reports the average endowment investment loss of our
peer schools to be 19.1 percent, according to the Association of
Business Officers of Private Schools. Most Ivy League schools
report endowment losses above 20 percent.
Chase emphasized the goals that have shaped the school’s
handling of this situation in the closing of her email. First and
foremost, PA hopes to maintain the “central aspects of the
educational program.” While we may struggle to adjust to these
economic challenges, the repercussions...
The Second Best Policy
By Phillipian Editorial Board
Published on September 24, 2009 in CXXXII no. 15You just got caught.
Your house counselor has just walked into your best friend’s dorm room to find three empty beer bottles on the floor, and two in the hands of your friends. There are six students in the room; only three have been drinking. You are not one of them.
As your face burns red, you profess your innocence. Unfortunately, two of your drunken friends choose to take that infamous advice, lie and claim that they too are innocent. You all smell of alcohol.
Is it wrong if the school chooses to breathalyze the three of you in order to back up the validity of each claim of innocence?
This school year is the second year that Andover’s new drug and alcohol policy will be in place, but some students’ perceptions of reality diverge from reality itself.
Phillips Academy has been in possession of drug testing and breathalyzer technology for over...
And Over Again
By Phillipian Editorial Board
Published on September 17, 2009 in CXXXII no. 14Welcome to Andover, new students. Welcome home, returning students. Juniors, stay true. Experience all that Andover has to offer, surround yourself with all that is new, but never forget who you are and why you are here.
Lowers, be smart. In the words of the Dead Poets’ Society’s John Keating, sucking the marrow out of life doesn’t mean choking on the bone.
Uppers, fear less. Keep your chins up and know that all it takes is discipline and determination to get out alive. You will survive.
Seniors, love more. Appreciate the beauty of this school and the beauty of our class. The countdown’s begun, the hour glass has tipped over. Finish out your Andover career without regrets.
Every September brings a fresh start. Every year at Andover, we don’t just grow older and wiser, we grow stronger. Here’s to 2009-2010....
Securing Traditions
By Phillipian Editorial Board
Published on September 17, 2009 in CXXXII no. 14At this week’s All-School Meeting, the Class of 2010 followed in the footsteps of generations of Seniors. We streamed down the aisles, just as generations before us have done. We raised our voices to a collective howl just as generations before us have done. We pounded on the backs of our seats, just as generations before us have done.
But we did it better.
This year’s Senior class started a new tradition at Wednesday’s ASM: a tradition of respect. The Class of 2010 exemplified the poise and respect that administrators called for last spring, all the while maintaining the pride, excitement and volume that each Andover Senior looks forward to achieving at that first ASM. It did not take a silent procession. It did not take solemn faces, the elimination of feverish enthusiasm. All it took was the commitment of the Senior Class, led by our Blue Key Heads,...
The Usual Pitfalls Are Deeper Here
By The Phillipian Editorial Board Cxxxii
Published on May 28, 2009 in CXXXII no. 13Seventeen DCs from one weekend makes us question the place of drugs and alcohol on this campus. As Phillips Academy students, can we afford to make the same mistakes as typical high school students? Or by coming here can we reasonably be expected to transcend the usual pitfalls of adolescence?
Obviously the Blue Book prohibits substance use on campus, but the crux of the matter is whether or not Andover students can be expected to actually hold themselves to this ideal.
The nuances of this situation are too complex for this Editorial Board to entirely reconcile amongst ourselves. To a certain extent, we can safely say that what you do at home on your own time is none of the school’s business, and certainly none of ours. But the price of prestige is costly. At this point in the year, the tolls these sacrifices have taken are clearly visible...
Give Respect, Get Respect
By The Phillipian Editorial Board Cxxxii
Published on May 21, 2009 in CXXXII no. 12Last week, Carlos Hoyt, All-School Meeting Coordinator and Associate Dean of Students, made a proposal that was far from modest. In his article “Call Me Crazy,” Mr. Hoyt used strong and insinuative language which came across, in parts, as both condescending and disrespectful. While we do not believe this was necessarily Mr. Hoyt’s sentiment, we do feel it enables us to respond with words just as strong.
In referring to student cheering as, among other things, “narcissistic, self-indulgent and obnoxious exhibitionism,” Mr. Hoyt abandoned the very foundation upon which a strong community is founded: respect. While we acknowledge Mr. Hoyt’s position as a school administrator, we would question how this conversation would work in reverse. How would the administration react if students referred to their actions as an “over-the-top rude spectacle of conceit and abuse of privilege and power?”
However, while rhetoric is well and good, actions speak louder...