| AU LGBT SURVEY results
Although AU's overall score on the Campus Climate Index was 3.5 out of five stars, its ratings of the various factors within the overall score varied. The ratings for each of the subcategories, out of five, were:
SOURCE: AU profile on Campus Climate Index's Web site |
AU received 3.5 of a possible five stars, or 61 percent on the Campus Climate Index survey. The University of Maryland received 4.5 stars, and Virginia's George Mason University got four stars, according to information published on the Campus Pride Web site.
The survey rated 104 schools across the country on their inclusiveness and support of gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgender students, employees and their allies on campus. It was produced by Campus Pride, the nation's largest gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender student organization, according to their Web site.
AU makes an effort to ensure that all students are treated equally, said Sarah Husseini, a sophomore in the School of International Service.
"I think it helps that the majority of people accepted to AU are cultured and open-minded enough to be accepting of other people's preferences," she said.
The rankings were based on surveys completed by school administrators, according to the Campus Pride Web site. Nicholas Sakurai, the program coordinator of the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender and Ally Resource Center, and Sara Bendoraitis, the center's director, completed the survey for AU.
Sakurai and Bendoraitis said AU had "room for improvement," yet maintained the Campus Climate Index was not a completely accurate summary of the current shape AU is in.
"We're on par in terms of climate with other schools that received 4.5 to five stars," Sakurai said.
Many students carry preconceived impressions of AU's liberalism, said John Marzabadi, vice president of AU Queers and Allies, the student-led gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender advocacy group on campus.
"A lot of people think it's a perfect place when it's not," Marzabadi said. "AU is perceived as a liberal campus, but this doesn't mean that everyone is immediately accepted."
These preconceptions are a possible result of a person's upbringing or his or her socioeconomic background, Marzabadi said.
Bendoraitis said the Campus Climate Index is "a good step as a generic gauge" but criticized the overall objectivity of the survey, specifically its failure to recognize any grey area in the issues at hand.
"It is a tool kids can use to determine if the campus is inclusive," she said. "But lots of the questions just aren't black and white in our minds."
Sakurai gave the example of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender-friendly roommate services, found under the category "LGBT Housing and Residence Life." In this category, AU scored particularly low, receiving only 1.5 stars out of five. This example demonstrated how AU's strong acceptance tendencies sometimes actually hurt its overall score, Sakurai said.
The question asked whether or not a school offers its gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender community a way to be matched with other "friendly" roommates. Although AU offered this service at one point, it had become superfluous over time, and Sakurai's office received only one request per year for special housing services, he said.
Administrators tend to encourage the random roommate selection process because AU students are typically very inclusive, he said. Residence life is usually well-equipped if this becomes an issue, both Sakurai and Bendoraitis emphasized.
"We don't offer this [roommate] service because we don't need to," Sakurai said, "[AU] is still a much better place to live than most college campuses."
AU also received low scores in the campus safety area, which reflects a low number of LGBT-friendly safety policies, according to the survey.
The low star rating does not mean AU has an unsafe campus, Sakurai said.
"We haven't created policies that would create a better [campus safety] structure," Sakurai said. "But we are a more inclusive and safer campus than most."
Specifically, an area where AU trails behind is in its protocol for reporting hate crimes and bias incidents, according to survey results.
"There are bias incidents on campus, but they are either not reported correctly or not documented as bias incidents," Marzabadi said.
The idea of instituting a Bias Incident Team has been discussed, according to Bendoraitis.
Schools with the top rating of five stars included: Oregon State University, Syracuse University, the Pennsylvania State University, University of California at Berkeley, University of Illinois at Chicago, University of Oregon and University of Pennsylvania, according to the survey's Web site.
