Budget Cuts Raise Privatization Question

Upcoming state budget cuts of 10 percent may push more public institutions of higher education in New York towards privatization.  Several state schools across the U.S. have experienced similar budget cuts and chose to no longer receive any state funding, but City University of New York (CUNY) schools are not yet among them.

With enrollment of 12,332 students, Baruch

College is one of 23 CUNY schools.

While privatization was discussed at Baruch College in years past, it is off-the-radar for now despite successive budget cuts from the state government. 

“It [privatization] would be disastrous,” Dr. Glenn Petersen, chair of the Sociology and Anthropology department at Baruch College said.

Center Director of the Zicklin School of Business at CUNY Baruch College Dr. Terrence F. Martell has joked about privatization, but is largely concerned that Baruch receive a fairer allocation of the CUNY operating budget. Petersen likewise said that Baruch receives a smaller percentage of state funding than other CUNY campuses.

If privatization is not in the cards for Baruch, funds will need to flow from another source.  In the past, alumni funding successfully offset the lack of government funding at Baruch, but Petersen said the alumni endowment is prone to rise and fall with the recession.
Raising funds from alumni also requires extensive time and energy and could place restrictions on how Baruch allocates the funding, an issue private institutions frequently deal with.

The NYSUT Union of Professionals posted a letter on their

website on March 13, 2011 urging members to reject privatization  

of CUNY and SUNY.

Privatization would likely raise Baruch’s tuition, a move Petersen said not match CUNY’s historical mission of seeking to ensure an equal chance for students to earn a degree independent of their family’s financial status.

“[Privatization] would allow us to hold onto the money…but the losses would far surpass the benefits,” Petersen said.  

Yet Baruch is already facing larger class sizes.  If budget cuts continue, small intensive classes would rise from 30 students to 120 students.  NYS Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver has said that the 10 percent budget cut will not affect the quality of education students are receiving, but Peterson disagrees.

“Without money we can’t hire people to teach…if you make the classes larger so students can get the classes they need, then they aren’t as good and the quality of education declines,” he said.

Ravinder Jaswal is one of many students that chose Baruck

for the Zicklin School of Business.  Jaswal said he would 

rather have higher tuition than see cuts in staff and programs.

While higher tuition could offset large class size, that idea is certainly not new at Baruch.  Students and faculty protested  last fall against the two most recent tuition hikes of five percent for the spring 2011 semester, and 2 percent for fall 2011.

CUNY Baruch student Ravinder Jaswal is a student at Zicklin, but said that he also understands the concern that large classroom sizes caused by low tuition rates may be a significant threat to receiving a quality education.

“We pay very little for it [Baruch College] but it still has a good name, that’s very rare in CUNY,” he said.

Recession Lowers New York Language Program Enrollment

MANHATTAN -- Since he arrived in the U.S. from Russia, Dmitry Tolstuougov has taken up the challenge of learning English, at two different programs.

Dmitry Tolstouogove, 46, is a student at the International Center in New York. 

He has been in the Conversation Partnership program for the past four months.  

“I was told my English is too good [for the other program],” Tolstuougov said.  “I never really studied there.”

For the millions of immigrants in New York City, learning English is a gateway to a better life and a better job.  Despite the many opportunities language instruction can provide, New York language schools were unable to avoid the effects of the recession.

The New York Language Center's (NYLC) local enrollment and staff per student ratio has decreased since 2007.

“The streets just aren’t as teeming with people as they were,” said Jim Shafer, information service manager. “Frankly, our numbers and every school’s numbers from that background are down.”

Vanessa Moronta is a student advisor of the New York
 Language Center’s Manhattan branch.  Overseas
enrollment at the branch dropped off quickly in 2007,
 but began to rise in 2009 to pre-recession numbers,
where it is today.

Before the recession, the majority of students at NYLC were local residents. This ratio flipped as 90 percent of the students at the midtown Manhattan branch are international students visiting the country on an F1 visa. These visas are given to students traveling abroad for the purpose of pursuing their studies.

Approximately 6,000 students have enrolled this past year at NYLC’s four branches, located in Midtown Manhattan, the Upper West Side of Manhattan, Queens and the Bronx.

Executive Director Barbara Dick said the number of students has dropped at every branch, as much as 30 percent at the Queens branch. The Midtown Manhattan branch has been successful in bringing the numbers back to pre-recession rates.

“We have to keep the program affordable, because it’s a very competitive market,” Shafer said.

Aside from language classes, programs similar
 to the International Center in New York frequently
 offer courses in business, culture, and U.S. history.

More than 100 language schools and programs operate in Manhattan alone. While the majority of language programs hire professors, the International Center in New York relies almost entirely on volunteers from the community.  Tolstuougov studies at the center through their Conversation Partner program.

“My wife said that my language is getting better. I might be here until August, it depends if I find a job,” Tolstuougov said.

A local resident studying at NYLC will usually pay $250 to $300 for a five-week course that meets 10 hours per week. International students pay more because they are required by law and the FI visa to study through a program that is 20 hours per week or more.

Shafer said NYLC is much more academic than a regular ESL program. The philosophy of its director, Rosa Fernandez, is to have students immersed in the English language. Students are only allowed to speak English in the classroom.

“We’re much more nuts and bolts…speak English, learn it that way,” Shafer said.

New York Smoking Ban

I made this video for a short class assignment while learning how to use the Aiptek camcorder. Enjoy!

100 Years of Humility

She welcomes family into her home and offers them baked goods.

Then she tells them to leave. 

A 100 year-old resident of Coon Rapids, Minn., Lois Kemming seems to know humility better than anyone.

Throughout her childhood, Kemming was constantly told she was imposing, because her father always dropped her off at her aunt’s house during the day.  

“My aunt had six kids. She needed me around like she needed a hole in the head,” Kemming said.

Ever since, Kemming has been seeking to put others before herself, whether she feels they deserve it or not. She will often tell her family to leave and go do something they really enjoy.

“She’s a terrible host,” her son Craig Kemming joked.

After starting work at a bakery at age 12, Kemming found no job beneath her and did what she could to support herself.  During World War II, she held a variety of jobs for a short time.  Although she worked in a wood factory, a nursing home, and the kitchen of a tea room, Kemming found no job too difficult or tiresome to complain about.

“I was happy, it was a better life than [when] I was living unemployed,” Kemming said.

It was while working at a tea room in 1936 that Kemming met her husband, Walt.  The two got married shortly after, and had a son in 1949.

Although she only received an 8^th grade education, Kemming sought to give her son the best opportunities she could to enable him to succeed.  She didn’t let her short education stop her from helping others, as she gave her time to leading a Sunday school class, her son’s Cub Scout troop, and a mission band.

Kemming’s husband passed away in 1964, and she has been living on her own ever since.  She currently lives on her own in an apartment complex close to her son Craig, daughter-in-law Susan, and grandchildren Jessica and Bethany.  Jessica is a nurse, and is frequently able to help Kemming with her medical needs.  Craig and Jessica visit her almost every day to bring groceries or just to visit, and are told to leave more than anyone else.  

Kemming is unable to attend church regularly, but is one of the few residents that regularly attend a small Bible study in her apartment building. Now she spends most of her time baking and cooking for her family, friends, and neighbors, putting others before her, even in old age.   

Grant’s Tomb Goes Unnoticed Despite 150th Anniversary of Civil War

The entrance to the memorial reads "Let Us Have Peace." 
Around 120,000 people visit the memorial each year. 
Photo by Bethany Kemming

The old joke asks: “Who’s buried in Grant’s Tomb?”

The typical answer is Ulysses S. Grant.  But National Park Service Language Interpreter Huascar Morell will say no one.  That’s because Grant and his wife are not buried but entombed above ground.

Regardless of the answer, the Manhattan area memorial isn’t seeing many more visitors this year, despite recognition of 2011 as the 150^th anniversary of the Civil War, according to Morell.

If the average New Yorker has heard of Grant’s tomb, she may be unclear on the details. 

Just ask Elizabeth Suzio, where is Grant’s tomb? “Virginia?”

Located at 122^nd St. and Riverside Drive in Manhattan, Grant’s Tomb has on average 120,000 visitors per year.  Considering that over eight million people live in Manhattan, this number is a small percentage.

Colorful mosaic benches surround the General Grant National Memorial.
The benches were made by Pedro Silva in 1972 as he sought to commemorate
Grant for making Yellowstone National Park America's first national park. 
Photo by Bethany Kemming

The many New Yorkers that don’t visit the tomb won’t gaze down into the dark center and see the shiny, adorned caskets of Grant and his wife.  They won’t see the American Eagles crouching at the entrance, the mosaic murals, the orange yellow glass, and the long row of trees outside, all part of the renovations to the memorial made during the Depression.  They won’t rest on the colorful mosaic benches outside, made by artist Pedro Silva who wanted to commemorate Grant in 1972.

Melody Cole may not have heard of the tomb, but she’ll tell you that doesn’t mean she doesn’t think they’re important. 

“They’re very important to teach people about America that don’t know,” Cole said.

While many New Yorkers believe memorials and monuments are important, many of them simply go unnoticed.  The same city that fought in 1994 to keep the Grants here and not in Illinois, now houses many residents that know little about Grant, the memorial, and the Civil War.

Stone American Eagles guard the entrance to the memorial.

The eagles were added during the Depression, along with the 

yellow orange glass, mosaic murals, and a row of trees.  

Many of the changes were a result of the Works Progress Administration’s 

Federal Art Project that sought to help bring artists, 

craftsmen, and designers back to work. 
Photo by Bethany Kemming 

“I don’t know what it [the memorial] is…but I love America. America is the best,” New Yorker Freddie Dn said.

 

More information:  The memorial

New Yorker article on N.Y. Civil War memorials
New Yorker article on Civil War legacy