A greater effort is needed from both students and faculty in tackling contentious issues on campus with the discretion and thoughtfulness they deserve. Diversity is not a clean and effortless idea; “Youth from Every Quarter” does not miraculously converge on some neighborhood in a fantasy borderless world. Rather, it is a sempiternal and at times daunting effort to understand the differences within and between every border. It is not enough to simply tolerate our cultural and individual differences—we need to encourage, express and respect them as well. Perhaps most importantly, we must ensure that a wide range of diverse voices and opinions are represented in the conversations that impact us all.
During times of drastic administrative change on campus, such as the recently proposed parietal rules, students and faculty alike must own up to the consequences of living within a fully realized and intentionally diverse community. Throughout the various rule changes and movements that have captured student attention during my two years at Andover, there has been little or no comprehensive explanation or effort by the faculty to communicate their reasoning to students openly. Many students have felt marginalized and even culturally offended by certain decisions and attitudes.
In order to remedy this, the administration must work to ensure that every member of the Andover community has the opportunity to contribute his or her unique insights and experiences to the discussion. There is nothing inclusive about community that designs policies that apply to everyone, yet only accommodate or represent a small group of people. Such efforts to centralize a community as complex as ours under narrow and partisan rules can only ever succeed in inciting tension between individuals and marginalizing certain groups or community members.
The Andover community must be cognizant of the fact that diversity is not an ornament that can be represented using statistics: Ours is a lifelong commitment. We have a collective responsibility to acknowledge and embrace the diversity we have intentionally created on this campus. That means celebrating each other’s differences and not engaging in exhaustive and deliberate efforts to make everyone act the same. We all have the capacity to learn from one another, and by doing so, to foster the multiculturalism and mutual respect that we speak of in such esteemed terms.
To say that maintaining this balance within our community poses a challenge would be an understatement, but we all chose to join to this community because the potential for individual and collective growth in a diverse population far outweighs the obstacles. By taking into account the nuances and difficulties that underlie policy discussion when our students and faculty hail from so many different walks of life, we can together ensure that Andover’s campus and community accommodate all of our different experiences and opinions.
_Alessa Cross is a three-year Upper from Tokyo, Japan, and a Commentary Associate for_ The Phillipian.
