CUNY DIGITAL HISTORY ARCHIVE

A participatory project to collect and preserve the histories of the City University of New York

We found 1046 items that match your search.

"Education is a Right"

"Education is a Right" produced in 1994 by Labor at the Crossroads, also known as Labor X, sought to understand some of the protest tactics, which made the 1989 CUNY strikes at least temporarily successful in fighting tuition hikes. In light of [...]

"Board, City Push Hunt for York Site"

This article from the New York Daily News details an early push from civic leaders to find a temporary location for the nascent York College in Jamaica, Queens. Founded in 1966, two years prior to this article's printing, the college initially [...]

Tweet: Cuts fall most viciously on community colleges

This tweet from August 2020 posted by a Graduate Center Ph.D. candidate spoke out against budget cuts at CUNY, especially those affecting community colleges and low-income students in particular. Focusing specifically on these issues was [...]

Tweet: My CUNY students are literally driving delivery trucks while taking online classes

This tweet from August 2020 by a CUNY faculty member responded to US Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez support for CUNY by highlighting CUNY students' essential labor while they are trying to learn at CUNY in the midst of the pandemic. This [...]

Tweet: Infographic About Free CUNY (as it was up until 1976)

This tweet from May 2020 is an infographic, created by the CUNY activist group FreeCUNY, and tweeted out by a CUNY faculty member, depicted the history of CUNY's costs to students until the mid-1970s and the social and economic benefits New York [...]

"CUNY, Public Colleges Face Mass Budget Cuts Under the Shock of COVID-19" (Teen Vogue)

This September 2020 Teen Vogue article written by a CUNY Graduate Center PhD student in Anthropology about the CutCovidNotCUNY movement provides national acknowledgement in a widely circulated public facing magazine with a younger reader base to the [...]

"Cutting Us to the Bone is No Way to Run a University System" (Queens Daily Eagle)

This Queens Eagle article, written in May 2020 by a Queens College professor in the English Department, describes budget cuts at CUNY in general and i as they relate to the history of Queens College in particular. The focus on a single CUNY college [...]

"Looming CUNY Budget Cuts Have Faculty and Students Fearing for the Future" (The City)

This May 2020 article in The City on CUNY budget cuts by a reporter who is also a CUNY alum, included testimonials by various CUNY students as well as provided context for the budget cuts in terms of federal and state funding. It also spoke to the [...]

"Not a Novel Crisis at CUNY" (Gotham Gazette)

This May 2020 Gotham Gazette article by a CUNY College of Staten Island professor, addressed the ways these austerity measures fit into a longer CUNY history of struggle. The article notes that even before the pandemic, CUNY colleges had struggled [...]

Open Letter of Commitment to Resist Cuts at CUNY: No Cuts, No Layoffs, No Class Size Increases, No Non-Reappointments

This widely circulated open letter from Rank and File Action (a group of militant activists at CUNY challenging the culture of austerity in public higher education) argued against budget cuts at CUNY. This document specifically addressed activism in [...]

CUNY Adjuncts, Union, A.O.C .and NYS Lawmakers Demand Jobs and New Taxes on the Rich

This May 2020 PSC slideshow argues for taxing wealthy New Yorkers in order to protect CUNY's budget, documented the increased reliance on contingent labor at CUNY (more than half of the teaching faculty) as well as the planned austerity cuts of up [...]

"International students, Left in the Lurch: New Yorkers Who Desperately Need Help" (NY Daily News)

This July 2020 NY Daily News article by two CUNY graduate students specifically documented issues faced by CUNY international students during the COVID pandemic, given CUNY's budget cuts, online instruction models, and requirements by the U.S. [...]

Caravan protest to save lives, save jobs and save CUNY in Brooklyn

Photographs and brief article from the artist and activist Erik McGregor that documented the Brooklyn caravan against cuts at CUNY. In addition to providing further documentation of these caravans across the city, McGregor's post provides important [...]

Tweet: #SaveJobsFundCUNY #CutCovidnotCUNY #MakeBillionairesPay

This Twitter thread from the Professional Staff Congress documents the caravan to save jobs and fund CUNY; it includes images of protestors on foot, bike, and by car, signaling onlookers to take stock of the #SaveJobsFundCUNY, #CutCovidnotCUNY [...]

"CUNY Administration Lays Off Hundreds of Faculty" (Left Voice)

Left Voice article written in May 2020 by a Graduate Center PhD candidate and City College faculty member. This document addresses CUNY adjunct layoffs, starting with the 400 adjunct employees laid off at John Jay (what was estimated to be 40% of [...]

"Spare CUNY, and Save the Education our Heroes Deserve" (City Limits)

City Limits article from May 2020, written by three Brooklyn College faculty members, on saving CUNY. The article directly and significantly addressed CUNY students as "heroes" for New York who work in frontline roles: from stocking essentials on [...]

Oral History Interview with Kazembe Balagun

In this interview, Kazembe Balagun discussed his time as a student organizer in the Student Liberation Action Movement at Hunter College. He considered SLAM!’s involvement in student government at Hunter and the possibilities and tensions it [...]

Oral History Interview with Lenina Nadal

In this interview, Lenina Nadal discussed her experiences in the middle of the 1990s in the Coalition Against the Cuts and as an original member of the Student Liberation Action Movement (SLAM!). She highlighted the importance of SLAM! being a women [...]

Oral History Interview with Chris Gunderson

In this interview, Christopher Gunderson (Chris Day) discussed the internal/external structure and origins of the Student Liberation Action Movement (SLAM!), as well as the ideological debates that took place within the organization in the 1990s. He [...]

Oral History Interview with Brad Sigal

In this interview, Brad Sigal, who studied at both John Jay College of Criminal Justice and the City College of New York in the 1990s, discussed the intercampus dynamics within the Student Liberation Action Movement (SLAM!) and CUNY organizing [...]

Oral History Interview with Neha Gautam

In this interview, Neha Gautam discussed the interconnected nature of race, class, gender, sexuality, and nation in the political structure of CUNY and New York. In particular, she focused on the ways in which it radicalized her, most notably in the [...]

Oral History Interview with Suzy Subways

In this interview, Suzy Subways discussed the queer and feminist politics of the Student Liberation Action Movement (SLAM!) and the larger movement in and beyond CUNY in the 1990s and early 2000s. She discussed her work with the Welfare Action [...]

Oral History Interview with Mariano Munoz

In this interview, Mariano Munoz discussed his time as a student organizer in the Student Liberation Action Movement (SLAM!) at Hunter College. He described the role of political education and radical study as the organization developed an [...]

Oral History Interview with Kamau Franklin

In this interview, Kamau Franklin discussed his experiences as an organizer with the Student Liberation Action Movement (SLAM!) and other organizations in New York in the 1990s, namely the Student Power Movement and the Malcolm X Grassroots [...]

Oral History Interview with Hank Williams

In this interview, City College student Hank Williams discussed organizing at CUNY in the late 1990s and early 2000s, after the middle of the decade which he identified as the peak of the campus movement. He talked about the relationship between [...]

Oral History Interview with Jesse Ehrensaft-Hawley

In this interview, community organizer Jesse Ehrensaft-Hawley discussed the Student Liberation Action Movement's (SLAM!) role as a movement incubator and supportive organization, particularly in relation to the work of FIERCE and other queer youth [...]

Oral History Interview with Orlando Green

In this interview, Baruch College student Orlando Green discussed the afterlives of the Black power movement through various student of color formations that operated around the Student Liberation Action Movement (SLAM!), Including SOUL, FIST, [...]

Oral History Interview with Rachel Laforest

In this interview, Rachel Laforest discussed her foundations in the New York Left and internationalist politics. She situated the Student Liberation Action Movement (SLAM!) and student organizing at CUNY in the 1990s and early 2000s within the [...]

Oral History Interview with Sabrine Hammad

In her interview, Sabrine Hammad discussed her political upbringing in a Palestinian nationalist household, and her relationships with her sisters who were also in the Student Liberation Action Movement (SLAM!) At Hunter College in the 1990s, where [...]

Oral History Interview with Irini Neofistos

In this interview, Irini Neofistos discussed the dynamics of the Student Liberation Action Movement's (SLAM!) role in Hunter College’s student government, which she took part in while a student at Hunter. Irini talked about her family’s radical [...]

The Educational Affiliate, The College in Brooklyn: Prospectus

Drafted in 1967, the Educational Affiliate, The College in Brooklyn: Prospectus, the work of the Affiliate had been inspired and supported by Senator Robert F. Kennedy. Staff of the Educational Affiliate included William Birenbaum, President, and [...]

February 1968 Memo and Press Release from Youth in Action

In this February 6, 1968 memo, the leaders of Youth in Action (YiA), an anti-poverty organization based in Bedford-Stuyvesant, responded to CUNY’s announcement of a new community college in their community, expressing grave concerns that community [...]

May 23, 1968, meeting minutes of the Bedford-Stuyvesant Coalition on Educational Needs and Services (B-SCENS) Steering Committee

On May 23, 1968, the Steering Committee of the newly-formed Bedford-Stuyvesant Coalition on Educational Needs and Services (B-SCENS), a network of education advocacy groups and community-based organizations, met to discuss how they would represent [...]

June 1968 Draft Statement for the Bedford-Stuyvesant Coalition on Educational Needs and Services (B-SCENS)

In this June 1968 statement drafted for the Bedford-Stuyvesant Coalition on Educational Needs and Services (B-SCENS), Dr. Dave Berkman, Steering Committee member of the B-SCENS, presents demands for a new public college planned in and for central [...]

Presidential Search Committee of Community College 7: Minutes July 9, 1968,

On July 9, 1968, the Presidential Search Committee for “Community College 7,” composed of five City University of New York officials and five appointed representatives of Bedford-Stuyvesant’s community-based organizations, met to discuss plans [...]

Minutes of Bedford-Stuyvesant Coalition on Educational Needs and Services Community July 11, 1968, Meeting with Negotiation Team

On July 11, 1968, the Bedford-Stuyvesant Coalition on Educational Needs and Services held a community meeting, at which the five-member Negotiation Team, appointed to represent them in planning Community College 7 with City of New York (CUNY) [...]

Minutes of July 25, 1968, Community Meeting of the Bedford- Stuyvesant Coalition on Educational Needs and Services

On July 25, 1968, the Bedford Stuyvesant Coalition on Educational Needs and Services (B-SCENS) held a community meeting to discuss ongoing negotiations with the City University of New York (CUNY) regarding plans to develop a new college in Central [...]

Minutes of the September 23, 1968, Presidential Search Committee Meeting

On September 3, 1968, the “Presidential Search Committee” comprised of five City University of New York (CUNY) officials and five appointed representatives of the Bedford-Stuyvesant community, met to discuss a new CUNY college planned for [...]

How the new Community College 7 will be "different": September 18, 1968 Letter from Al Vann to Frederick Burkhardt

On September 18, 1968, Al Vann, Chairman of the Negotiation Team and Steering Committee of the Bedford-Stuyvesant Coalition on Educational Needs and Services (B-SCENS), wrote to Frederick Burkhardt, Chairman of the New York City Board of Higher [...]

Proposal for a 1968 conference for the Bedford-Stuyvesant Community to allow for full participation in the development of Community College 7

On September 18, 1968, Jack Pannigan, head of Central Brooklyn youth club, Brothers and Sisters for African American Unity, drafted a proposal to his fellow members of the Bedford-Stuyvesant Coalition on Educational Needs and Services (B-SCENS) [...]

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