NYU Abu Dhabi’s pitch — what makes it stand out among its many elite, selective peers — is its diversity. With its 1,355 students hailing from over 120 countries and speaking more than 120 languages, NYUAD certainly seems like a very diverse institution. But this claim doesn’t hold up when we change the metrics to include socioeconomic diversity.

A study on diversity at NYUAD, published in 2017, found that students primarily belong to the middle and upper classes in their respective countries, come from highly educated households and have received an international high school education. For example, just over 80 percent of the surveyed population (49 percent of the NYUAD student body) attended an English-medium high school, and 65.8 percent attended a private school. 69.7 percent of respondents identified a US American movie as the last one they had watched, and 63.7 percent stated that they got their news from non-local, global sources.

Our socioeconomic background has a profound impact on our cultural consumption and worldviews. A socioeconomically homogenous community lacks the necessary range of experiences and perspectives that are a prerequisite to pluralistic academic engagement, even if it is internationally diverse. Sociological studies show that students with different values increase the likelihood of other students questioning their beliefs. Socioeconomic diversity is equally important for the prevention of increased cultural differentiation and isolation from the outside world, especially in an insular environment like NYUAD.

Our lack of socioeconomic diversity also affects our approach to global issues. Can a group of privileged students really capture all the complex realities that a conversation on poverty, violence, race or gender should entail? Our conception of global leadership — that oft-repeated idea of what it means to be an NYUAD student — falls short of the ideal if our global leaders’ perspectives are detached from the everyday reality of the vast majority of the world.

This is not to discount the achievements of NYUAD in terms of international diversity. The intellectual experiment we have embarked on is perhaps far more pluralistic than anywhere else in the world. I also recognize the presence of many individuals who are not socioeconomically privileged and contribute a wide range of experiences and opinions that our otherwise homogeneous student body may not be capable of disseminating.

There are also many challenges associated with creating a socioeconomically diverse student body while maintaining a high standard of education. The problem goes beyond NYUAD: socioeconomic resources give you much better odds of educational success, enabling you to reach the metrics that make you competitive for admission to selective universities. The quality of your home environment, your school and your teachers all impact your ability to retain skills fundamental to high educational attainment.

But we can still do better. The resources available to our institution confer upon us a responsibility to reach out to brilliant socioeconomically marginalized students and provide them with the resources to make it to and thrive at NYUAD. The notion that top students can only be found in elite schools is regressive and classist. Brilliance can exist anywhere, and admissions should make more of an effort to reach out to and support applicants from less privileged schools. Admissions criteria should place more emphasis on students’ achievements in light of their socioeconomic status and the opportunities available to them. Odds are, a student who has done well in an environment not conducive for academic success is as capable of thriving at NYUAD as one who has done brilliantly in a privileged environment.

Our much publicized diversity statistics therefore aren’t giving us the full picture. We must acknowledge the limitations of our current perspectives and work together to make NYUAD more inclusive.

Only then can we claim to be a truly diverse institution.