Summer 2000

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N E W S
N O T E S

High applicant yield boosts PA's bond rating

Citing Andover's "impressive demand" among applicants, Standard and Poor's raised Phillips Academy's rating on Massachusetts Industrial Finance Agency's series 1993 revenue bonds from AA+ to AAA. S&P's announcement comes six months after Moody's Investors Service upgraded the academy's long-term debt rating from Aa1 to Aaa.

Moody's Aaa rating and S&P's AAA rating are the highest investment grades in the market and are awarded only to the most secure credit risks. The higher the rating, the lower the interest rate an institution must pay to borrow funds.

In announcing the favorable rate hike, S&P noted that 71 percent of those students who were accepted for the fall 2000 term have announced their intentions to matriculate, a figure that is up from 63 percent four years ago. The high applicant yield rate makes Andover "one of the most selective preparatory schools in the nation," according to an S&P press release.

"While a bond rating like this looks like a strict measure of the school's financial health, it is in fact an affirmation of the soundness of the school's educational program and the quality of the teaching," said Chief Financial Officer Neil Cullen. "Excellent teachers attract superior students and enable us to maintain the confidence of parents, of alumni and of the colleges and universities that admit our students.

 

Faculty assigned new administrative roles

The academy has announced the following new assignments: Becky Sykes has been promoted from assistant head of school to associate head of school. Aya Murata, adviser to Asian and Asian-American students, has been appointed international student coordinator in the Office of Community and Multicultural Development. Chemistry instructor Paul Cernota has been named adviser for gay, lesbian and bisexual issues. Chemistry instructor Temba Maqubela has been appointed director of the (MS)2 program, Math and Science for Minority Students. French instructor Henry Wilmer has been chosen as director of the Language Learning Center. Math instructor Peter Washburn has become cluster dean of West Quad South.

Nobel Prize winner speaks on ethics in economics

Amartya Sen, left, the 1998 Nobel Prizewinner in Economic Sciences and this year's Palitz lecturer, visited PA on Friday, April 14, to pose the question, "Does Ethics Matter in Economics?" Professor Sen, pictured at right with Louise and Bernard Palitz '42, is Master of Trinity College, Cambridge University, and also Lamont Professor at Harvard University. The Nobel Prize Committee noted that Sen "has restored an ethical dimension to the discussion of vital economic problems."

Fuess Award honors three alumni scientists

Three alumni in the field of science have been named joint recipients of the 2000 Claude Moore Fuess Award for contributions to public service. The recipients, who were honored at the May 10 all-school meeting, were Fitzgerald B. Bramwell '62, Louis J. Elsas II '54 and Mary Wilkes Eubanks '65.

Bramwell is vice president for research and graduate studies at the University of Kentucky and is also a professor of chemistry and biochemistry there.

A professor of pediatrics and biochemistry, Elsas has been director of the Division of Medical Genetics at the Emory University School of Medicine since 1970 and is president of the Association of Professors of Human and Medical Genetics.

Eubanks is senior research scientist in the Department of Botany and university supervisor for secondary science in the Program in Education at Duke University. She is also president of Sun Dance Genetics.

The Fuess Award was established in 1964 by friends of Claude Moore Fuess, the academy's 10th headmaster.

 

Copyright, Phillips Academy, 2000