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Letter from Chancellor Bowker to Members of Community College 7 Planning and Presidential Search Committee

This letter from Chancellor Bowker to members of Community College 7 Planning and Presidential Search Committee came in response to a series of requests made by the Bedford-Stuyvesant Coalition in prior weeks. Those requests, expressed in a June 18, 1968 telegram from Al Vann, called for the furnishing of funds and space for use by the community's representatives on the Presidential Selection Committee. In this letter, Bowker suggests cooperating with the Coalition in fulfilling their demands in effort to reduce "the feeling of mistrust that now exists" between the community and CUNY. Bowker, however, is hesitant to proceed without the input of others and ultimately announces that he will defer to the consensus opinion of the Board of Higher Education.

Funding for the neighborhood's representatives had been the source of much contention in the preceding weeks, and was an issue that would not be settled for another month. Over the course of Medgar Evers College's creation, CUNY officials and Bedford-Stuyvesant community members often clashed, and this particular dispute is just one example of the several that arose from the community's efforts to exert influence over their college's development.

Source | CUNY Central Archives
Creator | Bowker, Albert H.
Date Created | July 3, 1968
Rights | Copyright CUNY Central Archives
Item Type | Text
Cite This document | Bowker, Albert H., “Letter from Chancellor Bowker to Members of Community College 7 Planning and Presidential Search Committee,” CUNY Digital History Archive, accessed March 19, 2024, https://cdha.cuny.edu/items/show/2802.

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