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City University of New York
The City University of New York (CUNY, pronounced /ˈkjuːni/, KYOO-nee) is the public university system of New York City. It is the largest urban university system in the United States, comprising 26 campuses: eleven senior colleges, seven community colleges, and eight professional institutions. The university enrolls more than 275,000 students. CUNY alumni include thirteen Nobel Prize winners and twenty-four MacArthur Fellows.
The oldest constituent college of CUNY, City College of New York, was originally founded in 1847 and became the first free public institution of higher learning in the United States. In 1960, John R. Everett became the first chancellor of the Municipal College System of New York City, later known as the City University of New York (CUNY). CUNY, established by New York state legislation in 1961 and signed into law by Governor Nelson Rockefeller, was an amalgamation of existing institutions and a new graduate school.
The system was governed by the Board of Higher Education of the City of New York, created in 1926, and later renamed the Board of Trustees of CUNY in 1979. The institutions merged into CUNY included the Free Academy (later City College of New York), the Female Normal and High School (later Hunter College), Brooklyn College, and Queens College. CUNY has historically provided accessible education, especially to those excluded or unable to afford private universities. The first community college in New York City was established in 1955 with shared funding between the state and the city, but unlike the senior colleges, community college students had to pay tuition.
The integration of CUNY's colleges into a single university system took place in 1961, under a chancellor and with state funding. The Graduate Center, serving as the principal doctorate-granting institution, was also established that year. In 1964, Mayor Robert F. Wagner Jr. extended the senior colleges' free tuition policy to community colleges. The 1960s saw student protests demanding more racial diversity and academic representation in CUNY, leading to the establishment of Medgar Evers College and the implementation of the Open Admissions policy in 1970. This policy dramatically increased student diversity but also introduced challenges like low retention rates. The 1976 fiscal crisis ended the free tuition policy, leading to the introduction of tuition fees for all CUNY colleges.
Historians Willis Rudy and Harry Noble Wright identify "the growing democratization of American life," rapid urban development and increased immigration as the socio-cultural trends leading to the founding of the Free Academy. They note that "the birth of the Free Academy in the metropolis of the New World came at the very time that European revolutionists were struggling for freedom and democracy in the Old." In the mid-19th century, free elementary and high schools sprouted up all across the country in an educational renaissance borne of organized labor, the expansion of suffrage, and industrialization. New York City, a booming metropolis and predominant seaport in the Western hemisphere, was uniquely situated to forge ambitious educational initiatives. The first free denominational schools were established on Manhattan Island in 1633; a system of secular schools was established in 1805. From 1825 to 1860, New York City's population rose from 166,000 residents to 814,000, making it the third largest city in the Western world. A number of newcomers were mercantilists from New England drawn to the advantages of New York's harbor, while "in the decades prior to the Civil War the farms of Ireland and the villages of Germany were the chief sources of New York's newcomers." The shifting demographics of the city spurred new debates over the creation of public higher education.
On March 15, 1847, Townsend Harris, then president of the city's Board of Education, published a letter in The Morning Courier and New York Enquirer that proposed a free public school where the children of the poor would have the possibility of advancement:
No, Sirs, the system now pursued by that excellent society and by our ward schools is the true one, and may be advantageously applied to higher seminaries of learning. Make them the property of the people - open the doors to all - let the children of the rich and the poor take their seats together and know of no distinction save that of industry, good conduct, and intellect. A large number of the children of the rich now attend our public schools, and the ratio is rapidly increasing.
This establishment of the Free Academy hailed "first municipal institution for free higher education to appear on this globe." This was not without debate, discussed in the newspapers of the day. Two of Harris's supporters, James Gordon Bennett of the New York Herald, and William Cullen Bryant of the Evening Post, supported the idea in their editorial pages. Horace Greeley, founder and editor of the publication the New-York Tribune and later a member of the Board of Education opposed the use of public funds for the school, although he supported its overall mission. Well into its existence, Greeley would continue to call for the closing of the Free Academy and that it "should be sloughed off in the interests of retrenchment." The argument made by Harris and his supporters in response was that money drawn from what was called The Literature Fund, a state budget for public education, "ought to be apportioned on the principle of the greatest good to [the] greatest number." They believed this would be best accomplished by the Free Academy.
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City University of New York
The City University of New York (CUNY, pronounced /ˈkjuːni/, KYOO-nee) is the public university system of New York City. It is the largest urban university system in the United States, comprising 26 campuses: eleven senior colleges, seven community colleges, and eight professional institutions. The university enrolls more than 275,000 students. CUNY alumni include thirteen Nobel Prize winners and twenty-four MacArthur Fellows.
The oldest constituent college of CUNY, City College of New York, was originally founded in 1847 and became the first free public institution of higher learning in the United States. In 1960, John R. Everett became the first chancellor of the Municipal College System of New York City, later known as the City University of New York (CUNY). CUNY, established by New York state legislation in 1961 and signed into law by Governor Nelson Rockefeller, was an amalgamation of existing institutions and a new graduate school.
The system was governed by the Board of Higher Education of the City of New York, created in 1926, and later renamed the Board of Trustees of CUNY in 1979. The institutions merged into CUNY included the Free Academy (later City College of New York), the Female Normal and High School (later Hunter College), Brooklyn College, and Queens College. CUNY has historically provided accessible education, especially to those excluded or unable to afford private universities. The first community college in New York City was established in 1955 with shared funding between the state and the city, but unlike the senior colleges, community college students had to pay tuition.
The integration of CUNY's colleges into a single university system took place in 1961, under a chancellor and with state funding. The Graduate Center, serving as the principal doctorate-granting institution, was also established that year. In 1964, Mayor Robert F. Wagner Jr. extended the senior colleges' free tuition policy to community colleges. The 1960s saw student protests demanding more racial diversity and academic representation in CUNY, leading to the establishment of Medgar Evers College and the implementation of the Open Admissions policy in 1970. This policy dramatically increased student diversity but also introduced challenges like low retention rates. The 1976 fiscal crisis ended the free tuition policy, leading to the introduction of tuition fees for all CUNY colleges.
Historians Willis Rudy and Harry Noble Wright identify "the growing democratization of American life," rapid urban development and increased immigration as the socio-cultural trends leading to the founding of the Free Academy. They note that "the birth of the Free Academy in the metropolis of the New World came at the very time that European revolutionists were struggling for freedom and democracy in the Old." In the mid-19th century, free elementary and high schools sprouted up all across the country in an educational renaissance borne of organized labor, the expansion of suffrage, and industrialization. New York City, a booming metropolis and predominant seaport in the Western hemisphere, was uniquely situated to forge ambitious educational initiatives. The first free denominational schools were established on Manhattan Island in 1633; a system of secular schools was established in 1805. From 1825 to 1860, New York City's population rose from 166,000 residents to 814,000, making it the third largest city in the Western world. A number of newcomers were mercantilists from New England drawn to the advantages of New York's harbor, while "in the decades prior to the Civil War the farms of Ireland and the villages of Germany were the chief sources of New York's newcomers." The shifting demographics of the city spurred new debates over the creation of public higher education.
On March 15, 1847, Townsend Harris, then president of the city's Board of Education, published a letter in The Morning Courier and New York Enquirer that proposed a free public school where the children of the poor would have the possibility of advancement:
No, Sirs, the system now pursued by that excellent society and by our ward schools is the true one, and may be advantageously applied to higher seminaries of learning. Make them the property of the people - open the doors to all - let the children of the rich and the poor take their seats together and know of no distinction save that of industry, good conduct, and intellect. A large number of the children of the rich now attend our public schools, and the ratio is rapidly increasing.
This establishment of the Free Academy hailed "first municipal institution for free higher education to appear on this globe." This was not without debate, discussed in the newspapers of the day. Two of Harris's supporters, James Gordon Bennett of the New York Herald, and William Cullen Bryant of the Evening Post, supported the idea in their editorial pages. Horace Greeley, founder and editor of the publication the New-York Tribune and later a member of the Board of Education opposed the use of public funds for the school, although he supported its overall mission. Well into its existence, Greeley would continue to call for the closing of the Free Academy and that it "should be sloughed off in the interests of retrenchment." The argument made by Harris and his supporters in response was that money drawn from what was called The Literature Fund, a state budget for public education, "ought to be apportioned on the principle of the greatest good to [the] greatest number." They believed this would be best accomplished by the Free Academy.
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