A Newsletter for The CityM Universityatters of New York • Fall 1999 Board of Trustees Approves 2000-2001 Budget Request Highlights Exit-from-Remediation Policy he draft 2000-2001 University Budget Request of the Board of Trustees will be considered at its November 22 meeting. The draft Request, which By Louise Mirrer Twas discussed at a public hearing on October 18, totals $1.4 billion. Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs Five areas critical to strengthening CUNY’s role in the City and State are emphasized. he use of tests based on national First, the Request proposes a strategy “for building national prominence by standards to determine when stu- drawing on the resources available to the system as a whole—the creation of a Tdents in remedial classes are “flagship environment.” The combined effect of a flagship environment and a ready to do college-level work was over- steady rise in admissions criteria will promote a clearer identity for CUNY’s top- whelmingly approved by the City Univer- tier colleges. Two important components of this initiative are “replenishing full- sity’s Board of Trustees on September time faculty at the colleges, a sine qua non of any first-rate institution, and a 27. The new policy reflects CUNY’s de- strategic effort to bring to the University significant clusters of new faculty in termination to establish appropriate particular areas.” criteria for student placement in credit- Related to the “flagship” strategy is current planning for a University-wide bearing courses. Honors Academy. Drawing on faculty from undergraduate, graduate, and profes- Strongly backed by Board Chairman Her- sional schools, the Academy will provide honors students special opportunities to man Badillo, Vice Chairman Benno C. benefit from expertise across the University’s campuses. This approach builds on Schmidt, Jr, and Chancellor Matthew Gold- CAPPR chair, Trustee Nilda Soto Ruiz the recommendations of the recent report of the Mayor’s Task Force on CUNY. stein, this action is the latest in a series of November. The examination will serve to second focus of the Request is support of academic achievement through fur- place students in remedial course work, as Ather investment in pre-collegiate and collegiate academic advising, counsel- well as determine readiness for exit. It ing, and tutoring—notably by expansion of the College Now program (see story will include a 45-minute essay to be grad- below). The $9 million in new funding represents a significant increase and will ed by trained faculty. The CUNY Math As- enhance counseling for approximately 36,000 students and expand tutoring for a sessment Test will continue to be used for similar number of students. The ultimate goal is to provide an environment in both placement into and exit from remedial which all students can make the necessary adjustments to college life and work. instruction in mathematics. Determining when students are ready for Continued on page 2 college-level work is an integral part of CUNY’s program to raise admissions stan- dards at its senior colleges. Refinement of THE FACES OF KINGSBOROUGH’S COLLEGE NOW this process will reinforce the University’s de- termination to begin phasing out remediation Scouting City High Schools in baccalaureate programs by January, 2000. Chancellor Matthew Goldstein For Major-League Students uring discussion of the new policy on measures designed to strengthen academic Dexit from remediation, Chancellor Goldstein submitted plans to require appli- By Robert Singer strictly–with a bow to a familiar sight on standards at the University. The policy was New York City playgrounds–as a metaphor cants to CUNY senior colleges to take stan- Associate Professor of English, recommended by the Board’s Committee on for agility, energy, and high-stepping col- dardized tests such as the Scholastic Apti- Kingsborough Community College Academic Policy, Program and Research laboration. (CAPPR). Its chair, Dr. Nilda Soto Ruiz, tude Test or the American College Test in This program, supervised by Dr. commented that it “moves the University one order to be considered for admission. The e all recently learned about the Rachelle Goldsmith, trains high school in- step closer to the ultimate goal of the Chan- SAT is already offered free of charge to po- problems Edmund Morris en- structors to teach a variety of specialized cellor’s plan: to ensure that students are ac- tential applicants at five CUNY campuses. Wcountered writing Dutch, his college-level courses to high school se- curately placed in college level or remedial Applicants who score below a prescribed long-awaited biography of Ronald Reagan. niors. Since its inception, we estimate work.” Implementation of the policy will threshold on the SAT, ACT, or Regents ex- Morris’s subject seemed so remote and un- that College Now has served 60,000 stu- begin this spring. aminations will be required to take CUNY’s engaged but at other times, affable, hu- dents–more than enough to fill Yankee own nationally-normed assessment tests. If they pass all tests, they will be admitted morous, even charismatic. Yet this biogra- Continued on page 6 s a first step toward establishing ap- pher had to discover, to some A propriate exit-from-remediation mea- to senior colleges. degree, who was this person? sures, Chancellor Goldstein convened an During discussion of exit-from-remedia- –what was the explanation for advisory committee comprised of faculty tion policy, Goldstein said that it has al- his undeniable success as a and student representatives and adminis- ways been his belief that “one indicator politician and President? trators involved in the University’s testing of college readiness is insufficient.” For Considering all his puzzle- program. This committee, which has been September 2000, he has proposed that ment, Morris perhaps should working with the Office of Academic Af- students applying to CUNY’s baccalaure- have called his book Double fairs, recommended a contractor for a new ate programs be judged in several re- Dutch, since the phrase once examination in reading and writing early in Continued on page 4 meant “unintelligible lan- guage, gibberish.” Luckily, I had none of Mor- ris’s problems with this as- IN THIS ISSUE signment, which is to profile The two famed authors at left another remarkable success differed over how to drive–a story, Kingsborough Commu- Teacher Joseph Gambuzza, pictured here with narrative, that is– at the most nity College’s flourishing College Now pro- his College Now students at Lafayette High School recent Queens College Evening gram. No crippling writer’s block, no far- in Brooklyn, is a perfect fit for the baseball allu- Reading (see page 5). The very flung legwork needed, and–best of all–in- sions in Robert Singer’s article. A baseball institu- first Evening Reader, 24 years stead of one (by many accounts mysteri- tion in the borough, he was Lafayette’s baseball ago and Queens professor ous) personality to deal with, I had multi- coach for 22 years and mentored the longtime emerita, at right, won the ple personalities to choose from, all will- Mets reliever John Franco. Featured recently in USA Today Baseball Weekly, Gambuzza had lucky National Book Critics Award for ing to tell their story: those of hard- players who enjoyed plenty of free Mets tickets: her poetry this year. Learn working College Now instructors and their the team’s owner, Fred Wilpon, also attended more about her on page 9. ambitious students. Double Dutch might Lafayette. And so, too, one hastens to add, did have made a good title for me, too, but pitcher Sandy Koufax.

1 riefly last summer, the historic APRÈS LE DELUGE—WAC the development of its writing policy New York question “Where were • Experimentation with—and subse- Byou when the lights went out?” was Afloat at a John Jay Conference: quent adoption of—promising new supplanted by “How did you make it to practices work in the deluge?” Improved Writing in the Disciplines • The development of clearly stated Metropolitan-area commuters will long goals, well described methods, provi- remember August 26th, when torrential By Dolores Straker sions for extensive faculty develop- rains flooded all forms of local transporta- CUNY Associate Dean for Academic Affairs ment and student support, and evalu- tion. Metro-North stopped running com- ation plans for all WAC programs pletely. In Manhattan, FDR Drive was riting Across the Curriculum has lum movement, which is founded on two A few words should be added about the closed, and play was halted on the West Wgrown out of the Board of Trustees’ assumptions. The first is cognitively based Writing Fellows Program, which is linked Side’s Joe DiMaggio Highway. All Central January 1999 mandate to assure that and suggests that writing is a unique mode to the WAC initiative and represents a com- Park transverses were flooded, and bus CUNY graduates bring fully-developed of learning in all disciplines. The other as- mitment to CUNY students at two levels: it schedules went on hiatus. Taxis? —don’t communication skills into the workplace sumption is rhetorically based and focuses advances the professional training of grad- ask! Those commuters who managed to and into graduate and professional on introducing students to the distinctive uate students, who in turn assist in improv- arrive at work were in time for lunch. schools. This can only be ing the writing skills of undergraduates. Meanwhile, on the John Jay College accomplished through the Advanced doctoral students will participate promotion of extensive campus, the meteorological anomaly was “Such groans of roaring wind and rain, I never in a variety of teaching and administrative whipping up a minor educational disaster. writing practice within activities designed to enhance undergradu- For August 26th was the opening day of each discipline, which has Remember to have heard. . .” ate learning and, at the same time, to a first-ever two-day summer institute been taking place at some broaden their own professional experience. planned by the leaders of CUNY’s Writing of our campuses since the –the storm scene in King Lear Across the Curriculum initiative, whose 1970s. WAC, however, is icture, now, the organizers who had objective is to enhance discipline-specific the first University-wide Ptrudged in early through the downpour writing skills on all CUNY campuses. The initiative. on August 26th to greet the 180 partici- institute had been designed to provide an A unique complement to WAC is the conventions and modes of discourse in pants scheduled to appear. A literary soul essential opportunity for disciplinary and Writing Fellows Program, which will ini- their chosen discipline. might have looked out onto Tenth Avenue cross-disciplinary exchange. As well, it tially deploy 85 specially trained CUNY The WAC mission has been to reform and thought of Shakespeare’s Lear in his had been hoped the seminars would ac- doctoral students from 31 disciplines. pedagogy rather than curriculum. Its em- big storm: “Such groans of roaring wind and quaint faculty and members of the newly They have been selected and matched with phasis has thus been on thinking-and- rain, I never/ Remember to have heard.” established Writing Fellows Program with programs on all 17 campuses. These Fel- learning and on attempts to bring about Baruch College’s George Otte and I, two the basic concepts of Writing Across the lows will assist in a variety of capacities to changes in teaching as well as enhanced of the event’s planners, met on an A train Curriculum (WAC)—and also give the support intensive writing instruction, and writing skills. WAC theorists have con- that was actually moving, and we pondered members of campus teams formed to im- they will be monitored by full-time faculty cluded that successful programs in the the horrible prospect of cancellation. It plement the policies and practices of WAC coordinators, who will work with them field must meet certain criteria: (1) they was all too easy to picture many empty on each campus the chance to get ac- closely throughout the academic year. must address all levels of the curriculum, seats. And would the momentum lost on quainted. During the past 20 years, tens of thou- from basic through advanced writing the first day undermine the events sched- Would these best-laid plans go the way sands of faculty, students and administra- courses; (2) faculty development must be uled for the second day (which, you will of Johnstown or, to think of more recent tors at hundreds of institutions have been an integral component of such initiatives; recall, was bright and sunny), we also floods, North Carolina and Mexico? exposed to the writing-across-the-curricu- (3) students must be allowed a broad asked ourselves. In the meantime, Vice range of audiences with which to commu- Chancellor Louise Mirrer’s office was on nicate; and (4) the entire faculty must rec- the phone requesting instructions for the Something Old, Something New ognize—and act to reap—the benefits of barrage of calls already coming in. academic literacy. But then something amazing began to happen: a few soggy faculty members and At Brooklyn College Library uring the spring 1999 semester, the writing fellows began to appear. The lucky DUniversity-wide WAC task force com- ones from nearby just walked. Others piled a summary of current and prior cam- were able to drive. One faculty member pus-level initiatives in this area. The fol- rode his bicycle. lowing goals guiding our efforts at CUNY And they simply kept on arriving—the are extrapolated from practices observed vast majority by truncated or makeshift within the University and at other institu- itineraries on public transportation. One tions: stalwart couple started their journey, got • An expanded articulation of the cen- soaked, encountered a train on fire, re- tral importance that writing develop- turned home, changed clothes, and started ment has in the entire undergraduate out once more. A writing fellow came in experience from New Hampshire. • An acknowledgment of the signifi- Yet the most difficult commute seemed cance of a given college’s mission for Continued on page 12

Budget Highlights, continued from page 1 Third, the Request commits the University to improving the undergraduate expe- rience by investing in the Writing Across the Curriculum initiative begun this year (an article on it begins above on this page). A valuable new resource now avail- able to students is the CUNY Transfer and Information Program and Planning Sys- round breaking for a major $50 mil- floor will become offices, a multipurpose tem (CUNY TIPPS), a website that assists them in planning course work and trans- Glion expansion and rehabilitation of room, and a reading room. A new audito- ferring between CUNY campuses. the Brooklyn College Library took place on rium is also planned for the new exten- The fourth focus of the Request is on a comprehensive University economic devel- November 4th. This project will give the sion. The two architectural firms of But- opment plan that will embrace and nurture a number of targeted initiatives such as Library more than 100,000 square feet of trick White & Burtis and Shepley Bulfinch the CUNY Institute for Software Design and Development, a Photonics Compact De- new space, renovation of the 1937 Richardson & Abbott have taken care, in vice Center, a Small Business Support and Incubator Program, and expansion of the Gideonse extension (118,000 sq.ft.), and a their designs, to preserve the primacy University’s workforce development programs. restoration of the 1937 LaGuardia Hall and detail of LaGuardia Hall and pre- Finally, the Budget Request supports the upgrading of the University’s technology (54,000 sq.ft.). serve the view of its tower from all cam- and data management. CUNY was recently ranked fourth in the nation in a PC Week When the Library, shown here in an ex- pus vantage points. survey. Building on this success, the University hopes to continue improving its local terior perspective from the Lily Pond, is In the last decade, the need for this pro- and wide-area network infrastructure, the digital resources of its libraries, and dis- available for occupancy in June 2001, La- ject became clear: by the mid-90s, Brook- tance learning opportunities. Revamping of CUNY’s major administrative manage- Guardia Hall, with its stately Georgian fa- lyn College was operating at approximately ment information systems is also a major priority in the Request. cade and imposing tower, will again be the 40% of City University space standards for main entrance. reading areas, even as storage capacity for $1.1 billion operating budget is requested for the senior colleges, an increase of The existing core stack will be reused the collections was diminishing. A $74.5 million. About equal amounts from these new funds are allocated for new for Special Collections, and will remain The project is being funded by the State collective bargaining requirements and for critical program improvements. The the only part of the building not accessi- of New York through the support of Gover- $375.9 million requested for the community colleges constitutes a $22.6 million in- ble to the public. The existing reading nor Pataki, the State Assembly and Senate, crease. Of this $5.5 million is for base-line needs, and $17.1 million is for program room on the second floor will be re- and with the assistance of the State Divi- improvements. stored, and the reading rooms on the top sion of the Budget. 2 RESEARCH•Matters Reaching Up & CUNY $2.5M U.S. Grant Opens Horizon Celebrate J.F.K. Jr.’s Life For Minority Research Scientists

For this column, which will appear as an occasional feature in future issues of CUNY•Matters, Dr. Leslie S. Jacobson, Acting Vice President for Research Development at the CUNY Research Foundation, has adapted material from the NSF grant proposal of Dr. Gail Smith, P.I., to support the Minority Graduate Education Program. n alarming fact for the university at CUNY by providing stipends for first- and world is that, while the population second- year students; the second is im- Aof the U.S. is increasingly multi-eth- proving retention rates among minority stu- nic, the academy’s Ph.D. candidates re- dents through workshops, research presen- mains nearly homogeneous—that is, white tations, and a planned Regional Network of and male. According to the National Re- graduate programs. The Regional Network search Council’s survey of the total popu- will involve joint activities with Polytechnic lation of science and engineering doctor- University, Stevens Institute of Technology, ates (1998), the population is “84% white, and the New Jersey Institute of Technology. 12% Asian, 2% black, 2% Native Ameri- The bottom-line objective for the five-year can, and less than 1% Hispanic.” The in- MGE Program is to triple the number of evitable result of so few doctorates is that CUNY minority doctoral graduates in sci- there are few minority faculty. ence, mathematics and engineering. The City University is in a unique posi- The MGEP is one of several the NSF has tion to assist in remedying these distress- funded that address the persistent lack of ingly low minority percentages. The Grad- diversity in doctoral education, notably in uate School and University Center already the sciences, engineering, and mathemat- produces African American and Hispanic ics —a critical national problem cited re- Ph.D.s at twice the national rate, and this cently by the National Science and Tech- One of the University’s major disabilities initiatives has been the collabo- stellar record will be further enhanced by nology Council: ration of the CUNY Consortium for the Study of Disabilities with a grant to support the Minority Graduate The scientific and technological ad- Reaching Up, the foundation established by the late John F. Kennedy, Jr. Education Program (MGEP), a collabora- vances that keep our nation at the Many of those associated with both organizations were present at a memo- tion between the National Science Founda- forefront of economic progress, mili- rial service held in the 1199 H&HS Union’s Martin Luther King, Jr. Labor tion and CUNY. tary preparedness, health care, and Center on October 22. Among the musicians who performed during the Funded for a total of five years and $2.5 quality of life for our citizens depend event was pop singer Nona Hendryx; she is seen here with Reaching Up million, the MGE Program, sparked by the upon a highly educated and motivated Vice President (now Acting President) Jeffrey Sachs. In the rear, from the CUNY Research Foundation, Office of Re- workforce. Developing such a work- search Development, will be led by Princi- force requires that the best and the Consortium, are Jason Chapin, left, and its director, Bill Ebenstein. Photo, pal Investigators Dr. Gail Smith (GSUC), brightest students from varying cultur- André Beckles. Prof. Neville Parker (City College) and al, ethnic, and socioeconomic origins GSUC Associate Provost Dr. Linda Ed- are prepared for careers in science wards. The MGEP objective is to increase and technology. CUNY minority Ph.D. graduates in the sci- undergraduate science students at the se- industry and other universities. It is ences, engineering, and mathematics as he proposed MGE initiative in science nior colleges and at collaborating colleges hoped that MAGNET-SEM, facilitated by part of an overall strategy to enhance re- T seeks to increase the enrollment, re- outside of CUNY. Enhancement of faculty traditional and technological communica- search capabilities nationwide and to tention, and doctoral degree completion of and peer mentoring systems is a core ac- tion systems, will establish a supportive guide a highly educated and diverse work- African-American and Hispanic-American tivity, and will be reviewed in regular meet- community of junior and senior minority force. This development effort is part of students in each of the following targeted ings of a Steering Committee and through scholars and minority doctoral candidates. the ongoing program of the Office of Re- disciplines: Biochemistry, Biology, Chem- the monitoring of enrolled students’ We believe this project will serve as a search Development at the Foundation to istry, Computer Science, Earth & Environ- progress. model for similar programs across the U.S. promote multi-campus collaboration on re- mental Science, Engineering, Mathematics, First-year doctoral students will also be More immediately, we hope our Minority search and training. Physics, and Speech and Hearing Sciences. enlisted to share experiences with the Graduation Education efforts will increase Improved recruitment of black and Lati- most promising undergraduates in their a steady and substantial stream of minority he City University of New York has no students to the targeted doctoral pro- discipline. They will also be exposed to mi- CUNY Ph.D. holders who will be national T long worked to enhance the level of grams will take place through the system- nority faculty from other CUNY campuses, leaders in research science for the new diversity among doctoral degree recipi- atic identification and nurture of talented as well as visiting scholars of color from millennium. ents. Today, its doctoral programs serve about 4,000 students across more than 30 disciplines. They are taught and men- tored by about 1,700 doctoral faculty, the vast majority of whom also teach on one handsome new Midtown cul- of CUNY’s college campuses—schools Elebash Hall in the New Graduate School Atural venue soon to open is which have a long history of educating the Baisley Powell Elebash under-represented minority groups. The Recital Hall in the Graduate Cen- NSF grant recognizes the colleges’ long- ter on Fifth Avenue. Seen here in term success in encouraging and support- a rendering by the Gwathmey & ing minority students eager to earn ad- Siegel firm, it honors two devoted vanced degrees. New York music lovers, Mr. and If treated as a single unit, CUNY granted Mrs. Elebash. Morgan Guaranty more bachelor of arts degrees to black Trust Company, Trustee of the students—3,360 in all—in the 1995/96 Elebash Fund, has granted the academic year than by the top three his- Graduate Center $1.5 million to torically black colleges and universities support musical programming combined. Yet, while CUNY has had sub- and dissertation work on music stantial success in increasing minority related to New York City. The graduate student success in the arts and Hall’s inaugural event next spring humanities, a similar level of high achieve- will be a symposium on the life ment has been elusive in the sciences. and music of early jazz great W.C. The NSF funding will operate the Minor- Handy. Full coverage of the new ity Access/Graduate Networking in the Sci- GSUC home in the former B. Alt- ences, Engineering and Mathematics man building will appear in the (MAGNET-SEM) project and will entail two next issue of CUNY•Matters. major components. The first is attracting additional minority students to matriculate

3 CUNY’S VIETNAMESE EXCHANGE PROGRAM the hope that a drunken Westerner will pared for the trip: Scent of Green Papaya, run over him with his car, both making Three Seasons, Heaven and Earth, Regret Of Cyclos, Pho, & Monkey Bridges: them rich and ridding them of their father. to Inform. And readings, too: Lady Bor- ton’s After Sorrow, Duong Elliott’s The Sa- Notes from Ho Chi Minh City Agent Orange cred Willow, Four Generations of a Viet- I've also visited the War Remnants Muse- namese Family, Duong Thu Huong’s Par- ince the CUNY-Vietnam Projects program was initiated in 1997 by the Col- um. It has an Agent Orange room with de- adise of the Blind, Graham Greene’s The S lege of Staten Island, 12 CUNY faculty from six campuses have visited Viet- formed babies preserved in formaldehyde Quiet American, Lan Cao’s Monkey Bridge, nam for two to three weeks to share their expertise as teachers of English as a and photographs of victims of the chemical Le Minh Khue’s The Stars, The Earth, The Second Language. In return, CUNY has hosted several Vietnamese colleagues agent sprayed during the 1970s. Also on River, Thich Nhat Hanh’s Our Appointment for professional visits to New York. The exchange, coordinated by Ann Helm, display is a public apology from Admiral with Life, Peace in Every Step, The Stone the director of CSI’s Center for International Service, has produced some no- Zumwalt to General Giap. Zumwalt had Boy and Other Stories. table advances. For example, the Vietnam-USA Society’s English Language Pro- been responsible for supervising the grams have begun to differentiate courses for a range of learners, from adults spraying, and his own son later died from “The Tale of Kieu” to children. CUNY ESL faculty have observed classrooms, helped select engag- exposure to Agent Orange. Also on view is This is the title of a 17th-century epic ing materials, provided new tools for assessment, and have introduced such in- a long apology from former Secretary of poem. One of my colleagues, who had novative modes of learning and teaching as student-centered classrooms and Defense Robert McNamara for the mis- served as a military adviser here in the the Silent Way methodology. They have also worked to enhance Vietnamese in- takes our government made during the 60s, said I must read it because so many tegration into the international ESL and linguistics community. war. There are now a lot of American Viet- Vietnamese quoted from it and I would un- These visits have also helped our faculty to understand better the needs of derstand a lot more about their phi- Vietnamese students at CUNY campuses, which may include focused attention to losophy of life, too. He said he pronunciation and speaking skills, academic writing, and American English. The doubted if we would have gotten CUNY faculty have enjoyed meeting their Vietnamese peers, and there is hope heavily involved in Viet Nam if more that longer assignments, of a semester or year, will be possible in the future. people in our government had read Teamed with Susan Price of Borough of Manhattan Community College, Judy this poem. One saying from Kieu I Gex, an ESL teacher at LaGuardia Community College since 1979, made her often heard was, "Women are like first trip to Asia as part of the program this last June. Previously, she has done raindrops. Their life depends on extensive teacher training in Benin, West Africa, as a Senior Fulbright Fellow. where they land." Intelligent women Gex kept a journal from which the following excerpts are taken. students and a successful Viet- namese business-woman I met have the same questions women in the Moving Soup Kitchens, Greenery U.S. have. Women who are not mar- Sometimes you hear the clinking of spoons ried by the age of 30 here have of the little boys announcing soup for sale. enormous problems both in their If you stop them, they'll run back and get birth families and in society. Anoth- you a bowl. Sometimes the women vendors er commonly repeated saying from carry it, all the serving bowls and utensils Kieu: "If heaven forces us to live a in big pots slung from a pole which they life of hardship, then we must live like that. CUNY ESL teachers Judy Gex, above left, carry on their shoulders. They walk with a and Susan Price with Dang Thi Bich Thuy, If heaven allows us to live a life of ease, lilting step which, I'm told, makes it easier Academic Director of the Vietnam-USA only then can we live like that." Many peo- to carry heavy weights. Greenery sellers Society. Seen at left, a movable feast of ple in Vietnam believe that heaven and put boxes of flowers and plants on the back soup—a common sight on the streets of earth change places in 30-year cycles. of their bicycles. They pedal these little Ho Chi Minh City. Below, Ann Helm con- gardens through the streets. gratulates a top graduate at the first grad- Monkey Bridge uation ceremony of the Society’s English My ESL students at CUNY will get a taste Hailing a Cyclo Program in November 1998 in Ho Chi Minh City. of Vietnam, too. I plan to use Lan Cao’s My favorite way to get through HCMC traf- Monkey Bridge in class. A monkey bridge fic is breezy and thrilling. If you've seen is a log thrown across a stream as the movie Three Seasons, you've seen a a footpath, with two smaller cyclo, a three-wheeled contraption with branches added as handrails. Lan the passenger seat in front. It's the Viet- Cao says moving from one culture namese version of a roller coaster. You to another is like walking on a mon- Teaching Tourists don't quite see how you are going to avoid key bridge. Native speakers of English from hitting or being hit, but you do. In order America, England, Ireland, to prevent arguments at the end of the What are you learning? Canada, and Australia who ride, I negotiate a price for it before start- Making this trip has been a big teach here are mostly young ing. I also wear a dress with pockets for privilege; the Vietnamese have been men about my son's age who money, after seeing Susan hurt when two very kind to us. And the ones we've have professions in their own people on a motorcycle reached over and met seem to love to learn. An Aus- countries (law, teaching). They tried to grab her backpack while she was tralian lawyer who is teaching here teach English as they travel in a cyclo. told me they are always asking around seeing the world to each other what they are studying make their living. Several of Good Morning Vietnam now. “They find it strange if you them have stopped here for sev- Sun up at 5:30, and the park across the say you are studying nothing.” eral years. It's a sweet life: a street is crowded with walkers, joggers good salary, no taxes, low ex- and people playing a kind of soccer game nam veterans with their families in HCMC penses, a warm climate. with an elongated shuttlecock. Breakfast as tourists. in Vietnam is pho. That's a big bowl of Exit-From-Remediation, continued from page 1 Respect Your Parents. . . noodle soup served with basil, mint, bean “Beautiful Resilience” in the Tunnels Today a group from our newly organized sprouts, red pepper, and nuoc maam (pro- The last war site I visited was the Cu Chi spects, including high school grades in nounced “nuke mom”), a very strong and English Club—150 students strong, ranging Tunnels, about two hours north of the city. specific academic subjects, the number yummy fish sauce. Fruit sellers come by in age from 10 to 75—made an excursion Beneath the lush green rice paddies and of academic courses taken, and scores with many fruits I've never seen: dragon to a beautiful pagoda. Everyone took turns lounging water buffalos is this large com- on nationally- or state-standardized fruit (a bright red and green fruit with sitting by Susan and me to practice their plex built on three levels over thirty years exams. gills—the inside, white with tiny black English. We were shown the pagoda’s pic- and housing 16,000 people. I traveled to The Chancellor has also instructed se- seeds, is delicious), fresh lichees, mango, tures of the punishments in hell for people the tunnels with two young women. One, nior college presidents to engage faculty sweet green bananas, and durian (a popu- who misbehave this time around. For ex- whose name means "Beautiful Resilience," bodies on their campuses in establishing lar, large, bumpy fruit that smells a little ample, children who disrespect their par- was born just months after the war ended specific admissions criteria for their col- like shellac). ents can expect to be ground into sausage. in 1975. The other, "Autumn Season," is leges and to convene an admissions re- the daughter of a soldier who fought for view board charged with considering stu- “Life’s Dust” . . .Or Don’t! North Vietnam in both the French and the dents in special circumstances. In dis- cussing this comprehensive proposal for In the more elegant tourist areas of town, A more shocking view of child-parent re- American Wars. She expressed sorrow senior college admissions, Goldstein told you can be accosted by small children beg- sponsibility surfaces, however, in a won- about the lonely American mothers who the Trustees, “Universities are always ging in English or young women carrying derful short story by Le Minh Khue, a con- lost sons here too. challenged on how to best assess student drugged babies to appeal to sympathetic temporary writer from Hanoi. In "Scenes preparation. I am persuaded that there visitors. People call them "life's dust." In from an Alley," some children set their 90- Homework for a Visit to Vietnam is a need to take a fresh look at the less chi-chi areas, you don't see them. year-old father under a tree every day with Here are some movies I enjoyed as I pre- process.” 4 DOCTOROW, MILLER, OATES across with a spike on the end of it and hope it’ll dig into the other side. Most of the time, of course, the rope just falls into Free SAT Tests Dream Cast for Queens Readings the crevasse.” Planned by CUNY columnist for the Queens Times/ mysterious, Oates saw her self as a “con- iller also suggested that dreams Ledger wondered aloud recently, trary example” from Doctorow: “Ed said Mare a source for him. “I dream of ll freshman applicants for A“How does he do it? This Joe that for him writing a novel was like start- things on the stage. I even have spot- AUniversity baccalaureate Cuomo guy. Does he know where the bod- ing out on a journey in a car at night. And lights in my dreams, especially on peo- programs will be required to ies are buried, have the negatives of the it was enough for him to have the head- ple who are dead.” He added, “I think submit SAT I results, beginning pictures, or what?” He was wondering lights on. . .he doesn’t know his destina- we’re all trying to say that any writing in the fall of 2000. This is how the founder of the Queens College tion inevitably, but he trusts in the journey that is really interesting involves the un- pursuant to a mandate of the Evening Readings (and professor of Eng- to get him there. Now I can’t write that known, the subconscious. How to get Board of Trustees. lish) managed to lure so many luminous way. I have to know my destination. . . down to where you yourself are involved In order to assist students scribes to his long-running series of read- have to have a map. . .As a writer, I al- that way is, I guess, the trick.” who plan to apply only to a ings, discussions, and roundtables on the ways know the structure of my novels be- “Not only do you drive along the road CUNY college, the Office of art of writing. fore I start. I know the ending, the final and only see as far as your headlights,” Admission Services is spon- The question was particularly apt on Oc- scene, the last sentence.” Doctorow observed, varying the point. soring a free Institutional tober 13, when a pride of literary lions— “Of course, I have a slightly different “If you are really lucky, you go off the SAT for current high school E.L. Doctorow, Arthur Miller, and Joyce approach,” said the author of Death of a road entirely!” seniors who have not previ- Carol Oates—appeared for a lively discus- Salesman, “because, in some part of my For information on other Queens Col- ously taken the test. Scores sion moderated by Cuomo that opened the mind, I have to see the stage rather objec- lege Readings through next spring, call from the free SAT may only 24th season. He believes the audience tively. A novelist can bring on 35 people 718-997-4646. be used for CUNY admission must have set a Readings record, for not at a party, and it doesn’t cost him any- application. only was the College’s Concert Hall SRO The free SAT is scheduled thing!” Still, the mystery of the process is Authors Joyce Carol Oates, E. L. Doctorow, Arthur on select Saturdays and Sun- but the sound had to be piped into the undeniable: “It’s a bit like trying to cross Miller, and moderator Joe Cuomo during a lighter nearby Choral Room, also full, to accom- an ice crevasse, and you throw a rope moment of a roundtable on the art of writing. days from November 1999 modate the overflow. through May 2000, from 8:30 All three authors agreed that to 12 noon. the writing process is mysteri- Students may register for a ous. “Books for me begin quite test in their borough by calling irrationally,” said Doctorow. one of three numbers at the “When I first started out, I al- Office of Admissions Services: ways had plans for books. I had Manhattan and Bronx (212- outlines, I did research, I had all 290-5631); Queens (212-290- these high intentions, and the 5679); Brooklyn and Staten Is- books would never get written. land (212-290-5639). The It was only when I learned to four testing sites will be trust the act of writing that I got Brooklyn, Hunter, Staten Is- going. That is to say. . .writing land, and York Colleges. to find out what I was writing.” For further information While she agreed that the call Nevanka Olijynk at sources of creative work are 212-290-5649.

Whimsy for the Old Millennium LANGUAGE SKILLS WITH FRIES ere is one scenario for the closing moments of the current millennium, Did Somebody Say BMCCDonald’s? Hcourtesy of CUNY poet Billy Collins. It comes from the first of the Lehman College professor’s three collections published by the University of Pittsburgh Press, The Art of Drowning (1995). Summer before last CUNY•Matters pub- s part of a pilot program that is by the Steck-Vaughn Company, one lished his poem “Morning” from Picnic, Lightning (1998), and Questions About Aplanned for replication nation- of the world’s leading educational Angels appeared this year. wide, Borough of Manhattan Com- publishers. munity College has been taking ESL BMCC President Antonio Pérez training to the Golden Arches. considers the collaboration an ideal Dancing Toward Bethlehem BMCC’s collaboration with the example of the College reaching into corporate food-service giant is one the community and opening educa- If there is only enough time in the final of six around the country designed tional horizons: “Because of the to assist employees in developing training we are providing, these em- minutes of the 20th century for one last dance their language skills. ployees are better able to perform I would like to be dancing slowly with you, Classes have been conducted this their jobs. . .and they may also semester by Steve Gilhooley at a choose to pursue further education- McDonald’s training room in Man- al opportunities at BMCC.” say, in the ballroom of a seaside hotel. hattan 1-1/2 hours two days each My palm would press into the small of your back week. According to Dean of Adult and Continuing Education as the past hundred years collapsed into a pile Acté Maldonado, Gilhooley of mirrors or buttons or frivolous shoes, “has been innovative in incor- porating oral presentations and McDonald’s literature into just as the floor of the 19th century gave way the classes.” and disappeared in a red cloud of brick dust. Shown here is the special badge that student-em- There will be no time to order another drink ployees wear at their job or worry about what was never said, sites. This encourages their fellow employees to use “English only” on not with the orchestra sliding into the sea the job, which comple- and all our attention devoted to humming ments their ESL classwork. Materials whatever it was they were playing. for these classes have been supplied free of charge

5 NYC TECH’S INTERGENERATIONAL READING CENTER Creating a Book World for Children Matters in the Public Schools CUNY LEHMAN, PUBLIC SCHOOLS COLLABORATE By Ellen Goldsmith and AnnMarie Tevlin Director and Associate Director of the Center for P.S. 32 teacher Janet Steinberg Intergenerational Reading at NYC Technical College First Playwrights Festival assembling a schoolbus for their original rap musical Recycle for the Bronx Young Playwrights Festival. osefina, a student at New York City of their children's education. They were I read to her before— Dramatizes Writing Skills Technical College, remembers being also forming ideas about how reading abil- just read. Now I ask, Jwith her children during a big thun- ity develops and how to make reading a “what did you think? By Marge Rice oration by the College and Community convey their view: derstorm this summer: “We were really pleasure rather than a chore. They want- What do you remem- School District 10 with DreamYard Produc- Oh, give me a home tions, an arts-in-education organization. where we are free to roam, scared by the heavy, noisy rain, the thun- ed to talk about these ideas with their ber?” I realized the he 10-year-old thespian was arts for District 10, who was eager to move where our air is clean to breathe. der, the lightning. My kids asked, 'Mommy, children's teachers; they wanted to influ- importance of valuing getting nervous. It was his beyond traditional musical productions to ex- or the students on stage, the Festival Our garbage is placed what's happening? what’s lightning?' I told ence what was going on in the classroom. what my child knows Tfirst performance on any plore new opportunities for learning and self- was every bit as exciting as an opening in recycled space. them, 'I can't really explain to you but we Some of the Program’s students initiated and giving time. stage, let alone the huge, fully professional, F expression. on Broadway, especially with the sense of Our earth is sparkling clean. . . have books that will give the answer.' We conversations; one student even started a 500-seat Lovinger Theatre on the Lehman Altogether, more than a dozen schools anticipation that filled the air before the cur- There were plenty of lighter moments as had so much fun reading the books togeth- Parent Readers Program at her daughter's I thought because I campus, with its ranks of spotlights and took part in the project, with six selected to tain rose. Their audience included family, well. During rehearsals, Festival co-produc- er—they weren’t scared anymore.” school. But the great majority did not feel only knew Spanish, I fancy amplified sound system. perform a fully-staged work: P.S. 32, 33, 207, friends, principals and administrators, er Betsy Shevey gave the classes a lunch- What Josefina had was a wordless pic- comfortable about communicating with was not going to be able Surrounded by his Bronx classmates, he 280, P.S./M.S. 37, and the Theatre Arts Pro- joined by the teachers who had worked all time introduction to the recently renovated ture book about a snowman and a beauti- teachers in this way. to read to my children. Now I realize thought back to all his rehearsals—the ones duction Company School. term to make this celebration of the arts a Lovinger’s backstage technology. “Does fully illustrated children's book about the It then occurred to us that communica- that there are good books in Spanish. and a place to rekindle and share their exper- in his public school, the ones at the Teachers involved in the project believe it learning experience as well. every actor have lunch in his dressing weather that featured a spider named tion between parents and teachers could Also, reading should be done at home tise with new teachers. Lovinger, and especially to those in his own helped their students learn in many ways. Most importantly, the lines that were spo- room?” one student wondered. “Only at Anansi—not the usual contents of a col- be enhanced if they shared a Parent Read- regardless of the language you speak. The Center for Intergenerational Reading fos- living room, where his father was acting Kerry Castellano believes her P.S. 33 1st- ken and sung on stage came not from other Lehman College,” she assured him. lege student’s backpack, you may think? ers Program experience. And so was born ters the Reading Starts With Us network through coach and audience. Looking into the audi- and 5th-graders, who adapted the story of pens, but from the texture and tempo of Working behind the scenes were Shevey, But Josefina had these books because she the idea of training teachers to provide Teachers noted positive changes in chil- a newsletter, annual Staying-in-Touch reunions, torium, he found that familiar face and sang "The Wizard of Oz," advanced in literacy their own lives. From a scenario about the an assistant professor who is also the resi- was participating in the Parent Readers family literacy workshops for parents, be- dren whose parents attended Reading and by providing technical assistance. to it. . .from the heart. skills. The older students first read the book, unsung heroes of the civil rights movement dent producer at the Lovinger, and other fac- Program, which is offered under the aus- ginning with early childhood education. Starts With Us. Common to all the Center’s programs is an un- There were some happy tears in the Green which meant learning new vocabulary. Then, to a rap musical about the environment, the ulty and staff from the College’s Department pices of the Center for Intergenerational “They seem to love story time even derlying focus on experiences that promote Room afterward. by working on the adaptation, they learned plots, themes and lyrics of the productions of Speech and Theatre. The Festival's suc- Reading at the College. hus began “Reading Starts With Us” more now,” says one. Another observed, reading development and enjoyment of a wide Many such memories were generated for how to rewrite and condense material. sprang from these 1st- through 9th-graders’ cess, Shevey believes, demonstrates that the- T(RSWU) in 1990 with a group of 20 “They are much more attentive to details variety of literature— folk tales, poetry, non-fic- more than 200 Bronx public school students Other skills were acquired as well. "The own experiences, families, and cultures. ater offers “another model for sharing cre- n existence since 1990, the Center for teachers from 10 East Harlem day-care and remember them better.” Yet another: tion stories, concept books, and wordless pic- last June, when the recently renovated 5th-graders designed and created the The six stage works presented by the stu- ative educational processes between our fac- IIntergenerational Reading (CIR) at New and Head Start programs. Five preliminary “Two from my class show a great deal of ture books. Each workshop book is presented Lovinger hosted the first annual Young Play- scenery," Castellano noted, “and they be- dents were either adapted from other media ulty and students, public school teachers and York City Technical College (NYCTC), pro- sessions were designed to prepare early- pride and tell stories of their mothers along with a reading and discussion strategy. wrights Festival. came role models for the first-graders, who (a re-working of A Midsummer Night’s students, professionals and the community.” motes the pleasure and learning that childhood teachers to run literacy pro- reading to them.” And parents and chil- For example, the strategy of prediction (“What The latest initiative from more than a were our Munchkins. All the children Dream) or original, as with “The Princess comes when adults share literature of high grams. These workshops for parents took dren are now borrowing more books to do you think will happen next?” and “Why do decade of interaction between Lehman Col- learned how to work together—I don't think and the TV,” a fairy tale in which a king and uring the term leading up to the Festi- quality with their children. Our programs on the format of a book-discussion group read to each other. you think so?”) works very well with folk tales. lege and the Bronx’s public schools, the Fes- there was one child who didn't know every- queen seek to rescue their daughter from the val, Shevey worked in district class- begin with adults, and aim to be as engag- and featured linked children’s and adult With The Little Red Hen, a big favorite, feathers tival brought theatrical artists, teachers, and D one else's lines!” powerful spell of video. The students at P.S. rooms with Jason Duchin, artistic director of ing for them as for children. readings. For example, an article on han- he final RSWU program included an always fly when parents discuss the different more than 200 Bronx students together to That kind of focus was evident during the 32 also chose the course of adaptation. Tak- DreamYard Productions, to guide the creative The Center's roots explain this commit- dling child discipline problems extended T exciting collaboration with the Brook- predictions about the hen sharing the bread with experience hands-on creativity as a personal performances, adds Marcia Dolan, a 1st- ment. As members of the NYCTC Develop- the discussion of Maurice Sendak’s Where lyn Public Library’s Walt Whitman Branch her friends who preferred not to help with and positive force. This burst of fledgling ing aim at threats to the environment, they process. Duchin had completed earlier pro- ontinued on page 12 mental Skills Department in the mid- Continued on page11 theatrical adventure was the result of collab- altered the lyrics of “Home on the Range” to jects with Geri Hayes, the director of cultural C 1980s, we—along with Ruth D. Handel (now of Montclair State University and au- thor of An Urban Family Literacy College Now, continued from page 1 pected of my students at the college level, Brooklyn. Since 1986, he has been the pro- lyn, where she teaches Behavioral and So- from Sheepshead Bay High School is en- Program)—were struck by comments our Stadium. With 221 team members now, the pro- especially such academic literacy skills as gram coordinator for College Now and also cial Science. I called between innings to ask rolled in a humanities section and told me students in reading classes were making: gram serves about 8,000 students annually. multiple revision of essays, scrupulous direct of FDR’s college counseling office. Ted her, so to speak, about her minor- and “College Now has given me the discipline "Tiffany used to like reading and now she proofreading, and new approaches to textual has also been involved with the Kingsborough major-league experience. “Because of my and direction I need to plan my future at doesn't," for example, or "Frederick only s one of the College Now coordinators of analysis.” She also noted, “My pedagogical campus’s annual “Family Day,” a forum for College Now preparation, sociology was one CUNY.” Another student at Edward R. Mur- listens for a short time when I read to A the English program, which serves hun- students and parents to learn about college of the first courses I took in college, and this row High School in Brooklyn says, “I know I him." Their concern was for their chil- dreds of students throughout the city, I did admission and financial policies. allowed me to see very early in my college can handle college-level work. My English dren’s reading, not their own. From these not even have to invent a fictional persona College Now, Timmins says, has given him a career what my interests were. This led to a instructor makes us work hard but it’s worth observations came our idea of offering to describe its impact. But I did realize that, better “view of how students can learn to tran- career in the Social Sciences. College Now it.” And one student won’t be on the Seward workshops in reading and discussing chil- like Morris, I had to make a leap into the scend their own limitations and become active puts you on the right road. I even have Park High School farm team for long: “I can dren's literature. So began Parent Read- past as well as the present in order to grasp readers and writers. In College Now English friends who took it and became teachers hardly wait to go to Baruch College to study ers Program in 1987. the future. Unless I heard from a variety of classes, they develop portfolios and begin to just as I did. In fact, my instructor at Fort business, something I learned so much The Program has been recognized by sources with first-hand experience supervis- see themselves as writers. This is special.” Hamilton High School, Mr. Wolfson, remem- about in my College Now class.” awards from such organizations as the ing, teaching, and actually attending College How well is College Now working from bered me years later.” (Steven Wolfson, English-Speaking Union, the New York Met- Now classes, I would never get to the “rose- Timmins’ perspective? “Where do I begin? chair of Fort Hamilton’s history department, n October we all basked in the Yankees’ ropolitan Association of Developmental Ed- bud” of it all. We start at 6:45 a.m. and have more than is a 15-year College Now veteran.) Irecord-setting World Series win streak. ucators, and the National Association of The first person I contacted, Frank Volpi- 279 students–isn’t that incredible! When I Before a seventh-inning stretch, Costalas Manager Joe Torre singled out enthusiasm in Developmental Education. In addition, it cella, is not only the United Federation of visit a class and see groups discussing com- expressed hope that the program would be explaining the triumph–which inspires me to AnnMarie Tevlin with Denise Mahadio, a NYC Tech student in Americorps training to was included as one of ten "pioneering and Teachers representative for the borough of expanded. “It is so important for high say that, if one single word “clears the bases” work with elementary school children in Ft. Greene, Brooklyn. Photo, George Lowe. promising" family literacy programs in First Brooklyn but also a 14-year Behavioral and school students to get a taste of college be- in accounting for the College Now win streak, Teachers, published in 1989 by the Bar- Social Science veteran of College Now at COLLEGE NOW’S EXPANSION TEAMS fore they leave their high school building.” 7 it is enthusiasm: plain, old-fashioned, I’ll-be- bara Bush Foundation for Family Literacy. the Wild Things Are, and for a globe-trot- in Fort Greene, the Red Hook Branch, and New Utrecht High School. Getting warmed Fresh out of College Now and on the CUNY glad-to-talk-and-work-with-you enthusiasm. By recognizing students in positive adult ting non-fiction children’s book titled the Macon Branch in Bedford Stuyvesant. up for a New York-Atlanta play-off game, he By next year College Now will be in operation at roster right now is Michael Cenname. A And there is no need to create a fictional 1999 graduate from New Utrecht High character to make this point. I need merely roles and providing opportunities to link Bread, Bread, Bread we actually discussed Librarians enriched Reading Starts With Us was in a good mood. “College Now is a new College Now alumna Vivian every CUNY campus. Approximately 13,000 stu- their literacy development with that of recipes for bread from different cultures. workshops with book talks, came to RSWU challenge for the students, who are highly Costalas in her Telecommuni- dents in more than 100 high schools will be en- School, he currently attends Brooklyn Col- recall my many years as one of the supervi- lege and plans a career in mass communica- sors of the English program for College Now their children, the Program has made an The parent workshops also served as a parent workshops, and hosted Saturday motivated. I don’t know where I would be cations High School classroom riched by such activities as skills assessment, ad- in Brooklyn. tions, a subject he first studied in a College and the decidedly non-fictional motivated impact on participants' lives. The follow- discussion forum for children's responses family events featuring an orientation for without it, because College Now made me a visement, basic skills instruction, and college-credit ing testimony of one parent is typical: to literacy activities. One obvious benefit parents, activities for children, and library Now course. “That class really helped me and talented public school teachers I have better teacher.” coursework. If the College Now line is approved of RSWU, we correctly hoped, was the cards for everyone. Volpicella attributed the success of College perspective has developed be- prepare for the future,” Cenname recalls. worked with. Once, for example, I casually in the current Budget Request, it will be able to I'm strengthening her mind when I'm transformation of parents into frontline lit- Having succeeded in spreading the in- Now in part to how teachers are “treated as yond grades K-12 into areas “The teacher also taught speech, so we had mentioned in a staff conference a writing serve an estimated 28,000 high school students in reading to her. And, believe it or not, eracy teachers. ability to put a good children’s book true professionals.” To the sounds of the na- involving higher education,” to brush up on our oral presentations. This lesson I had invented that used jury trials to I think when I'm reading to her I'm To date, there have been four RSWU pro- down, Center staff began to hear laments tional anthem, he added, “The College Now referring particularly to her 2000-2001. was a healthy dose of reality. . .and gave me show how emotions affect our perceptions, also learning. Sometimes when I'm grams in which 20 day-care centers, nine from teachers and administrators that administrators and professors I have met interest in interdisciplinary a glimpse of the faster-paced, no-babies-al- adding that I used scenes from the movie M reading I'll explain something in my Head Start programs, and seven public there were not more parent workshops. want to help the students succeed in their approaches to teaching the lowed style of college-level teaching.” with Peter Lorre (a much better actor than own words, using a word that's maybe schools have participated. The following And so, in 1998, we initiated the obvious college careers.” humanities.” College Now, she adds, “bridges plex editorials from Newsweek or when I In fact, Cenname asserts that the College Reagan!). Later that day four teachers re- a little too big and she'll ask what the parental observations—or, to use a book sequel with the help of participants at Next on my line-up was Maryann Cuc- the gap between theory and practice.” Asked read the third draft of an essay on arms con- Now curriculum was as demanding as his quested copies of my materials, and I word means. I'll tell her, and she'll world term, blurbs—eloquently capture previous RSWU sites : “Continuing Read- chiara, a basic writing/ESL instructor at why she thought the program was successful, trol, I know something is right.” current subjects. The experience, he says, learned afterward that all four taught the use the word. the impact the initiative has had: ing Starts With Us” (CRSWU). This pro- James Madison High School since 1988. She Cucchiara ventured, “the equity and access made it possible for him to learn the sim- lesson, developing new and compelling in- gram is designed to offer teachers new to is also the director of the adolescent literacy College Now offers to all students, including n deck for me was Vivian Costalas, who plest and most important lesson of all: “I sights in the process. s time went on, it became apparent I used to tell her what I think. I RSWU the tools to conduct our workshops project for Brooklyn high schools. Cucchiara English language learners.” Ois not only a College Now alumna but could do more.” But please–in the tradition of CUNY grad A our students were beginning to take a learned to let her say what she thinks for parents. For returning teachers, told me that working for College Now “has Ted Timmins did not remember me as a for- also a new adjunct faculty member at I then spoke with several College Now Jonas Salk, who preferred the honor of stu- much more active interest in the content . . . use her imagination. workshops serve as a refresher course given me a more enriched idea of what’s ex- mer English teacher at FDR High School in Telecommunications High School in Brook- rookie students from around the city. One dent scholarships–no ticker tape.

6 7 CELEBRATING THE PUSHKIN CENTENNIAL Medgar Evers Scholars Matters ’ Honor African-Russian in tow, Hannibal among them. Upon By Fred L. Price arrival in Russia, the young Hannibal hat started as an intellectual ex- was freed by the Tsar, Peter the cursion to Russia became a spir- Great, who also protected and edu- Poets W itual journey also,” recalls Dr. cated him. And see page 5 for a Y2K poem Andrée Nicola McLaughlin, Medgar Evers by CUNY poet Billy Collins. College professor of literature and lan- ushkin’s great-grandfa- guage and interdisciplinary studies. “As Pther received the best education of the day, we began to appreciate the magnitude of (“I hate despotism!” he wrote to a friend). both in Russia and Aleksandr Pushkin's talent, courage and When his writings inspired political resis- France, became a mili- impact, we connected with humanity's tance, Pushkin experienced censorship, tary engineer, and sub- great potential to excel creatively, to tack- exile, surveillance and travel restrictions sequently distin- le adversity, to envision a blissful world.” for the remainder of his life. (See the guished himself as an McLaughlin’s inspiring memory is of the small ode to liberty in the sidebar, an Imperial Army gener- Pushkin Bicentennial Symposium & Study 1823 poem from his exile.) al. Pushkin’s pride in Tour—of which Medgar Evers was one of Among Pushkin's most acclaimed writ- his ancestor is ex- several international co-sponsors—that ings are his poems, “Ode to Liberty” and plicit in this passage took place last June in Moscow and “Ruslan and Lyudmila”; a novel in verse, from a poem he ti- St. Petersburg. (She was also pro- Eugene Onegin (famously transformed tled “My Genealo- gram coordinator for the Interna- into an opera by Russia’s most eminent gy”: “The Black- tional Pushkin Bicentennial Commit- composer, Tchaikovsky), the story “The amoor/ Bought at a tee.) Coinciding with official obser- Queen of Spades,” a prose collection, vances by UNESCO and Russia, the Tales of Belkin, and the historical drama event commemorated the 200th Boris Godunov. anniversary of the birth of Alexan- “With Freedom's Seed” In 1831, Pushkin married Natalia Gon- der Sergeevich Pushkin (1799- charova, a high society beauty. By all ac- "Behold, a sower went forth to sow." 1837), world-esteemed African-Russ- counts, her social ambitions put him in ex- ian poet, father of Russian literature, and cruciating debt, and her rumored flirta- brother Negroes.’” pioneer of Russian as a literary language. With freedom's seed the desert sowing, tions were a source of scandal. Although Pushkin clarified his Participating artists, writers, intellectu- I walked before the morning star; debate persists about a conspiracy behind African heritage thus: als, educators, students, elected officials From pure and guiltless fingers throwing— his death, history records that Pushkin “The author on his and other interested parties comprised a fought a duel to defend Natalia's reputa- mother's side is of Where slavish plows had left a scar— delegation from Africa, Asia, Europe, tion and was mortally wounded. Thou- African extraction. His The fecund seed, the procreator; North America and the Pacific Islands. sands appeared at his Moika home in St. ancestor, Abram Petro- Oh, vain and sad disseminator, The group joined hundreds of thousands of Petersburg to bid farewell to their beloved vich Hannibal, in his revelers who traveled from abroad to par- I learned then what lost labors are . . . poet, dead at only 37. To the present day, eighth year was abduct- take in Russia's nationwide festivities hon- Graze if you will, you peaceful nations, Pushkin remains the most widely read and ed from the shores of oring Pushkin's life and legacy. Who never rouse at honor's horn! quoted Russian writer. The Interdisciplinary Studies Depart- Africa and taken to Con- stantinople.” Should flocks heed freedom's invocation? ment at MEC co-sponsored the symposium he Pushkin Symposium, held at “Hannibal, an Ethiopi- Their part is to be slain or shorn, and study tour in collaboration with the Moscow State University, included an of noble origin and Their dower the yoke their sires have worn T Institute of Asian and African Studies of scholarly presentations on several topics Pushkin's great-grandfa- Moscow State University, among other in- Through snug and sheeplike generations. related to Pushkin’s ethnic identity ther, was seized and stitutions and organizations of Canada, (African Origins of Pushkin, the African conveyed to Turkey in re- South Africa, the UK, as well as the USA. Presence in Early Europe, Russia’s Histori- taliation for his father's In addition to McLaughlin, three other cal Relations with Africa), as well as refusal to pay a sum of money to Turkish bargain, grew up staunch and loyal/ The MEC faulty served on the Bicentennial recitations of Pushkin's writings and occupiers,” according to MEC's Russian- emperor’s bosom friend, not slave.” Committee: Dr. Clinton Crawford (Mass recitals featuring songs and operatic arias born Professor Knizhnik. Shortly there- Communications & Art), Dr. Tatyana inspired by him. McLaughlin and other Flesher (Mathematics), and Prof. Leonid after, a visiting emissary of the Russian ushkin himself was to challenge the Continued on page 10 Knizhnik (Academic Computing). emperor absconded with several youths PTsarist regime of his era with his pen

ushkin is credited with single-handedly Pgiving birth to modern Russian litera- Yevtushenko Leads Pushkin Fête at Queens ture by both his inventive virtuosity in a re- markable variety of literary genres and his Godunov—the music performed by soloists employment of the native vernacular and the Queens College Orchestra, con- (French having been up to his time the lan- ducted by Maurice Peress. guage of the cultural elite). Pushkin is also Prior to these artistic fireworks, Russia’s hailed as an important literary innovator elder poet-statesman, who has called and as a drum major for justice and liberty. Pushkin “the first multicolored and multicul- Pushkin was only fifteen years old when tured poet,” opened with a personal tribute he came to public notice as a gifted black in which he likened Pushkin, as a national poet under the Tsarist regime with the icon, with Shakespeare, Dante, and Goethe, publication of his poetry in the premier adding that he was also something of a Russian magazine, Messenger of Europe. n October 28, Thomas Jefferson and Tom Paine as well. To contemporaries, he stood out as much Queens Col- Then read a new poem of his own to mark for his strong classical formation, which O lege’s professor of the occasion. Titled “Paul Robeson and numerous biographers attribute to European lan- Pushkin,” the seven-minute work superim- Pushkin's aristocratic family background, guages and litera- posed on Yevtushenko’s life-long impres- as for his apparent black ancestry, which The famed Russian poet performing two crucial functions, hailing and popping, at ture Yvegeny Yev- sions of Pushkin his memories of the icono- was reflected in what were described as a the “Champagne for Pushkin” celebration. Reciting Pushkin’s poems with him were tushenko, led an Queens drama students Natasha Scott and Dike Matthew. Photos, Karen Leon. clastic African American singer when he "swarthy face, wavy hair, thick lips, nose elaborately orches- gave a concert in Moscow in 1949. with wide nostrils. . .” trated salute to Aleksandr Pushkin at LeFrak Hall on campus Yevtushenko remembers Robeson being asked by an inter- In The Poems, Prose and Plays of that offered a performance of Pushkin’s Mozart and Salieri (the viewer how he could sing Russian folk songs with such feeling Pushkin, editor Avrahm Yarmolinsky basis for the play and movie Amadeus), Russian songs on Pushkin . . .and Robeson replying, “Because I have a close relative in writes of Pushkin as being proud of his texts, a balletic version of Tatyana’s Letter Scene from Eugene One- Russia.” Who might this be, he was asked. “Pushkin” was the lineage and liking “to refer to his African gin, and then the ideally exhilarating climax: the Coronation daring reply, any reference to the poet’s African heritage doubt- origin, on one occasion speaking with Scene from Mussorgksy’s opera based on Pushkin’s Boris less infuriating Stalin. sympathy of the fate of those he called 'my

8 AWARD-WINNING QUEENS COLLEGE VETERAN A Poet in the Classroom: Marie Ponsot Reminisces By Rita Rodin (1981) and The Green Dark (1988), as well as the latest book, were all published by Knopf. Poet and publisher Lawrence Fer- Cornerhis year Marie Ponsot’s latest book live in a world where to be different is an linghetti, whom she met on a of luminous—one reviewer said “iri- asset. Balance is the trick.” crossing to Paris soon after World T descent”—poetry, The Bird Catcher, War II, published her debut vol- won the National Book Critics Award, one of n 1967, having published her first book ume, True Minds (1957), when he the nation’s most prestigious literary prizes. Iof poetry, True Minds, and the Signet started City Lights Books in San This must have delighted a quarter century’s Classic Fables and Tales of La Fontaine in Francisco. Dinitia Smith, her inter- worth of Queens College writing students, her translation, Ponsot moved into the viewer for the New York Times, who knew her as an inspiring teacher able English department at Queens College. said of her work “A Marie Ponsot to nurture the poetry and improve the acuity Some years later, in her poetry writing poem is a little like a jeweled in any aspiring writer. I was lucky enough class, she became one of my most memo- bracelet, carefully carved, with to be one of them. rable teachers. It was a mixed class in small, firm stones embedded in it.” Professor Emerita Ponsot never intend- age and achievement, but all worked hard In addition to many poems about domes- Marie Ponsot (photo, Rosemary Deen). The image ed to be a teacher, however. “My mother and bravely read their work aloud. Her tic life, friendship, and marriage, Ponsot featured on the jacket below is a detail from a fres- co in The Stag Room of the Palais des papes in was a teacher, my grandmother was a encouragement flowed, no matter what the touches sometimes on death—notably in Avignon, France. teacher, my great aunt Minnie was a level of talent. Every poem-in-progress The Bird Catcher. The poem quoted here is teacher. Everyone expected me to be a came back with thoughtful line-by-line dedicated to a Queens professor of com- sot, who was raised in a middle class teacher. I said ‘No way!’” comments in her minute hand, noting what parative literature and good friend who Queens home by educated parents, was Instead, with an M.A. from Columbia was good, where the image could be sharp- vanished mysteriously while on vacation in just 16 . She volunteered to work in a University, Ponsot worked at translating er, where the meter might be changed. Indonesia and to a father who suffered a youth program run by the Catholic Interra- 37 books of fairy tales and other stories, “Reading everyone’s work was the best heart attack and drowned while swimming cial Council in Red Hook, Brooklyn. “A mainly from French to English, all the part of the day,” she said. “If you are as in the ocean with his young sons. priest spoke to our assembly and said they while trying them out on the perfect prod- interested in writing as I am, what a privi- She hadn’t intended death as a theme in wanted to keep the program open in the uct-testing audience: her own seven chil- lege to have people giving theirs to you!” the book, she said, but “when you are 78, summer when free lunches provided by the dren. She also wrote radio and television The comments reflected her approach you have seen a lot of close people die and City during the school year otherwise scripts, but after she and her French artist to teaching writing, “You don’t need to be realize that it is a popular human hobby, stopped. It struck me like thunder that husband separated when the youngest told what you did wrong. You need to be something we all do sooner or later. As there was such need.” child was five years old, she needed to find told what you did right, especially in poet- Wittengenstein said, ‘You don’t have to She recalls, “I basically just played with a steadier job. ry. You may know what you thought you think about it. Nobody lives through it.’ I the children, who ranged from four to 14. She found one teaching writing in the were doing, but until someone responds to don’t think of it as a limit, but it changes But I learned how much you can learn SEEK program at Queens College in 1966. it, you may not know how much you got the way you think about time. You realize about other people just from their way of One class meeting and she was hooked: out on the page. You need someone to tell that the past is the present. Time doesn’t being! They were very poor, but they “It was a class of ex-offenders. They were you this. Error evaporates in writing if thought of themselves very smart, very acute, learned everything you leave it alone,” Ponsot observes as ‘this is how it is.’ I you threw at them, and they had had a adamantly. “We learn by the pleasure of learned to listen—and hideous education. They were there to getting it right. The only way to practice OCEANS I learned how lots of learn to write. People say you can’t teach writing is by doing it right—and then going (for William Cook, drowned in Maine, people in this world writing,” Ponsot says, but then adds firmly, back and doing more of it right.” and for Roy Huss, lost in Indonesia) are exactly like you, “Yes you can.” (One of her former students, by the way, though they may seem “CUNY students,” she reminisces, “have has been doing something very right for Death is breath-taking. We all die young, different. One day our an absence of arrogance. This may mean the art of writing on the Queens College our lives defined by failure of the heart, usually rackety store less self-confidence than they will eventu- campus for 24 years. Joe Cuomo estab- our fire drowned in failure of the lungs. front became very ally need, but that absent arrogance is an lished the Queens College Evening Reading Still planning on pouring the best ripe part quiet. I was told in asset because they learn to listen more series in 1975, inviting distinguished writ- of wines our need or grasp has sucked or wrung Spanish that a funeral quickly. They have a strong realization ers to read from their work. His choice for from fruit & sun, we’re stopped before we start. was passing and saw a that what you learn is how you create the very first reading was, if not surpris- Taste like talk fades from the stiffening tongue. hearse followed by yourself. They live with a tippy balance as ing, certainly auspicious: Marie Ponsot.) people on foot. Al- they try to determine which is more impor- In reach of what we’ve wanted, our hope is strung though as a child I had tant: being the same or being different. very day brings writing and revision, toward closing chords of accomplishment; we been taken to wakes They can get a little panicked being in a with Ponsot often putting an apparently E grip ourselves. because my parents place their parents never went, but they completed poem away for months before Cut off we go stunned, raw felt children should looking at it again. The year I was in as a land-child brought out to see only know of death as a her class she set herself the task of ocean all the way to sky. Shut in awe part of life, I had a writing a sonnet a day. “The wish to we wrap our secret in us as we die sense from these chil- write poems,” Ponsot explains, “mobi- unsaid, the deaf objects of good-by. dren that this was lizes the preconscious part of language something to which that is in our heads. Our heads are you pay real respect full of language and experience is kept have a neat form. It is more a feeling of and attention. It is a big deal.” in memory in a language way. We have swimming in time, not a specific address Ponsot approached the singlehanded to give it a chance to energize.” or place.” raising of a daughter and six sons with a “I love to walk in the city or in the similar appreciative attitude. “I loved hav- country among trees,” she says in ex- small woman, with large blue eyes ing children,” she said, “although I scandal- plaining how a poem begins. “With and a lively face, Ponsot’s humor, ized my mother by having so many.” Her the physical involvement that goes A obvious joie de vivre, delight in her chil- maternal love is certainly reflected in this with walking, I often get a phrase— dren and grandchildren, and passion about passage from “The Story After the Story” in coming from nowhere—that sounds writing and teaching suggest a person The Bird Catcher about preparing her “bed- right. I might even know where I am much younger than 78. ready boys” and daughter for sleep: going with it, whether it is a ‘writable’ Though retired from Queens College phrase. I have a notebook with little since 1991, she still teaches for the 92nd I crib them, warm in their phrases I have caught. If I start from Street Y and Columbia and NYU graduate soft shirts, & sit to eat a bruised sweet apple that, if I make a sentence, get a programs. “Queens was wonderful! CUNY as I nurse Chris and float on mild air shape, begin a structure, I may have gets the best students—their desire to some sense of who is talking and why learn is acute and they are very often more a story for everyone: Monique & Denis they are talking.” focused on the subject than on a career.” Settle on child-chairs; we are a tangle, The Bird Catcher is her fourth col- An interest in students from less privi- Bitch and pups, in the oldest comity. lection of poetry. Admit Impediment leged backgrounds was sparked when Pon- 9 Tony Randall, BEAUX-ARTS COURTHOUSE TRANSFORMED Seven Alumni Newman Real Estate Facility Honored by CCNY Inaugurated at Baruch College t its 119th Alumni Dinner in Midtown on Nov. 5, the City College Alumni As- ew York City’s premier facility for real estate education Huxtable: “the past lives only as part of the present.” A sociation bestowed its highest awards on and public policy, Steven L. Newman Hall at Baruch Col- “Weaving the old and new involves not only economic and N actor and ubiquitous New York City cultur- lege, was inaugurated at ceremonies on October 21. The functional considerations, but aesthetic ones as well,” Gold- al figure and seven distin- neoclassic building, designed in the beaux-arts style, dates stein added. “This beautifully restored building fulfills both Tony Randall guished graduates. from 1915, and was for many years the City of New York’s sets of concerns in breath-taking fashion. . . .The renovation Randall was the 52nd recipient of the Children’s Court. Subsequently, the landmark, at 137 East has retained and revitalized all of the original period ele- John H. Finley Award for service to the 22nd Street, served as the College’s Student Center. ments, while also supporting the needs and tastes of con- City of New York, which is named after The building will provide faculty offices for the school of temporary users.” CCNY’s third President, who went on to be- Public Affairs and meeting and conference rooms. It will Thanking Baruch College’s benefactor, Goldstein ac- come editor of the New York Times. Ran- also be the home of the Steven L. Newman Real Estate Insti- knowledged, “The Institute would not exist today were it dall was honored for his long local stage tute at the College. Architect for the project was Kohn Ped- not for the generosity and vision of Bill Newman, who has and television career (his debut on Broad- ersen Fox Associates. infused his personal values in it.” way was in 1941), his leadership of the Applauding the opening on a campus he knows well, Chan- “Crucial policy questions regarding real estate, land de- National Actors Theatre, and his charity cellor Matthew Goldstein praised Newman Hall as perfectly velopment, and management in the City are being debated,” work, notably with the Myasthenia Gravis exemplifying the observation of Pulitzer Prize-winning archi- Goldstein added, “and CUNY’s energetic minds should have Foundation. tectural critic (and Hunter College alumna) Ada Louise a strong, clear voice in that debate.” The Townsend Harris Medal, estab- lished in 1933 and named after CCNY’s founder, recognizes outstanding post- graduate achievements. The seven win- ners this year represent, as usual, a striking variety of careers. Robert Janus-Faced—But in a Nice Sense: Catell (‘58ME, ‘64MEE), who joined Brooklyn Union as an engineer just after New ‘Looking Both Ways’ Publication graduation and worked his way to CEO, is now Chair and CEO of Keyspan Energy. ppearing In November from the CUNY Association of Writing Supervi- most productive explorations, some of Among the current projects of architect A Looking Both Ways Project will be sors—in cooperation with the City’s the issues that proved particularly Joseph L. Fleischer (‘66Arch) is the its initial publication: Looking Both Board of Education. stubborn, and some of the common Clinton Presidential Library in Little Ways: High School and College Teach- The Project brought together more understandings that emerged from Rock; he has designed many cultural edi- ers Talk About Language & Learning., than 60 high school and CUNY college thinking about high school and col- fices across the country. Charlotte The Project is an initiative designed to teachers in seminars that met lege writing together. Frank (‘50B), a pioneer in education re- encourage high school and college- throughout last spring term do dis- Throughout Looking Both Ways, form, is now a Vice President with Mc- level writings teachers to share peda- cuss common issues related to writing ideas and words of the participants Graw-Hill’s educational division. gogical strategies and experience. It instruction. The book, authored by give fascinating glimpses into the Robert T. Johnson (‘72) has been is a joint undertaking of the Office of the eight seminar leaders with addi- ways teachers look at their work and elected to four consecutive terms as the Academic Affairs, the N.Y.C. Writing tional contributions from the Project’s strive to improve it. For copies, con- Bronx District Attorney. New York Times Project at Lehman College, and the directors, highlights the seminars’ tact Glenda Phipps at 212-541-0375. Washington bureau chief and Pulitzer Prize winner Michael Oreskes (‘75) began his career, aptly enough, as editor of The Campus. Lillias White (‘78) gar- Pushkin, continued from page 8 nered a 1997 Tony for Best Featured Ac- literary scholars spoke of Pushkin as tress, for The Life and will be, with Jim “Shakespeare's peer.” Carrey, in the forthcoming film How the One American participant had especially Grinch Stole Christmas. And Arthur pertinent ties to the Pushkin Symposium: Zeikel (‘54B) was for 20 years president Dr. Lily Golden, the author of Africans in of Merrill Lynch’s prosperous Assets Man- Russia and a distinguished scholar in resi- agement Group, which he built into the dence at Chicago State University. Golden, third largest such firm in the world, who was a visiting scholar during the inau- building client assets from $300 million guration of the Shabazz Chair at Medgar to $300 billion. Evers College earlier this year, is herself of Russian-African ancestry. Born in Some Academic Table Talk Uzbekistan to an American agronomist from Samuel Johnson who had studied under George Washington Carver at the Tuskegee Institute, Golden Medgar Evers College professors Andrée McLaughlin and Leonid Knizhnik at the How Johnson dealt with a boring colleague: was the first black student to earn a Ph.D. Moscow River, with the walls of the Kremlin in the background. Many brought flow- “He talked to me at club one day con- at Moscow State University. She offered a ers to the statue of Pushkin in St. Petersburg that appears on page 8. cerning Catiline’s conspiracy—so I political analysis of Pushkin, comparing withdrew my attention, and thought his influence and fate to that of Malcolm X about Tom Thumb.” and Martin Luther King, Jr. Pushkin from a black literary perspective." human soul which this illustrious ances- Members of the MEC delegation also tor continues to touch.” When a meeting goes nowhere: nother highlight of the Pushkin Sym- had opportunity to visit the cities Pushkin In the U.S. a ground-breaking ceremo- “We had talk enough, but no posium entailed a meeting in Moscow loved most, Moscow and St. Petersburg, ny was held on June 4 at George Wash- A conversation; there was nothing with members of the African-Russian com- sites of two major Pushkin museums, his ington University in the capital for a discussed.” munity, who shared their struggles for eco- lyceum, and his last home of residence. Pushkin statue to mark his bicentennial. nomic development and care for black or- Some traveled to Pushkin’s estate in Pskov The Bicentennial Committee plans a A perfect squelch for an academic rival phans, as well as their concerns about (then Michail-ovskoe), where he was exiled forthcoming anniversary exhibition and (Johnson was referring to Mrs. Macaulay): racism and racist violence in post-Soviet and where he is buried next to his mother lectures on Pushkin in the USA and else- “To endeavour to make her ridiculous is Russia. (Russia’s black population is esti- at Svyatogorsk monastery. where. Dr. Crawford, the Committee’s like blackening the chimney.” mated to be approximately 14,000 in a na- chair, is confident “Medgar Evers Col- tion of 149 million.) ooking back on the study tour, McLaugh- lege can be one of the places where A not exactly ecumenical colleague: Discussing her awareness of Pushkin's lin fondly recalls, "We witnessed a sea people will come to study Pushkin, the L “He has a mind as narrow as the neck African heritage and the Afro-European of diverse faces, representative of the global writer and the African-Russian.” For in- of a vinegar cruet.” contribution to literature, McLaughlin community, all united by the simple act of formation about another Pushkin study salutes the late writer John Oliver Killens paying homage to the splendor of Pushkin. tour next May 25-June 7, contact Dr. Isa How to unwind from a hard day on campus: for his early articles in the now-defunct Indeed, even with a full schedule of activi- Jeanette Blyden—a Symposium speaker “A tavern chair is the throne of human journal Black World: “Killens' book on ties, we were energized by our observations and the grand-daughter of Edward Wilmot felicity.” Pushkin, published posthumously, is a and exchanges. We came away renewed by Blyden, "father of African Nationalism”— treasure for those wanting to examine our knowledge of the commonality of the at [email protected]

10 FROM A NEW HISTORY OF BCC acceptance to the senior colleges, the community colleges were faced with the task of educating students whose high Open Admissions school records put them in the lower half or even in the lowest quartile. The impact Comes to the Bronx on Bronx Community College was dramatic and immediate. For Fall 1970 admission, ortunately for Bronx Community College, Morton Rosenstock’s 4,000 students were invited to attend, F institutional memory about the campus goes back to the very begin- twice the previous year’s acceptances. ning. The emeritus professor of history—his specialty is American Jewish Enrollment climbed steeply, from 8,865 history—taught there from 1958 until his retirement in 1995, and he was in 1970 to 11,756 in 1971 to 13,668 in also Acting President during the unenviable budget crisis year of 1976-77. 1974. By 1975, the College was serving The Bronx native and graduate of its James Monroe High School still vividly more than 14,000 students, double the recalls being “present at the creation,” which took place on February 2, number when Colston arrived. 1959. On that day, Rosenstock was among the twelve original faculty members on stage with the College’s first president, Morris Meister, in o handle this influx, staffs had to be Hunter College’s huge Assembly Hall (the College’s first campus from 1959 T expanded, new quarters sought, bud- to 1973, the former Bronx High School of Science on West 184th Street, get obtained. In 1970, for example, 116 was not yet ready for occupancy). In the audience were the College’s first new faculty members were engaged at 123 students. Rosenstock’s interest in the campus has continued during BCC, including eighteen new counselors. retirement. He has just published a substantial history of BCC, Four More important than the logistics, a Decades of Achievement. Following here is an excerpt adapted from the wholesale shift in educational philosophy volume that describes the impact of open admissions, which occurred dur- was required. Well over 50% of the newly ing the 1966-76 tenure of BCC’s second president, James A. Colston. Col- admitted students required remedial aid in ston, the son of a poor Florida farmer who rose to become the president of reading, mathematics or writing. It was Knoxville College, was the first black president of a predominantly white easy to blame these problems on the poor institution of higher learning in New York State. preparation students received in the city’s high schools, but the fact remained that the colleges had to develop programs, and resident Colston’s arrival on the student protests, revised its timetable and New York educational scene coin- adopted a proposal by Bowker to imple- Pcided with a period of intense pres- ment the open admissions plan five years sure by the minority communities on the sooner than originally projected. For Fall city fathers to open the gates of higher ed- 1970, the Board approved a plan under ucation to all high school graduates. In which students who were in the top half of the late 1960s, there was continual con- their high school graduating class or who troversy between City College and its sur- had an 80% average would be guaranteed rounding community in Harlem, which felt admission to a senior college. All other excluded from the benefits of higher edu- high school graduates would be admitted cation. The University’s Chancellor then, to one of the community colleges, regard- Albert H. Bowker, and the Board of Higher less of high school average or course Education responded to these pressures preparation. and to their own good-faith desire to im- prove the socioeconomic status of New ronx Community College’s enrollment York’s black and Hispanic youth. Bhad been expanding slowly during In 1968, the 1966-69, and Board approved a the student plan promising ad- body’s ethnic mission to a tu- The CUNY Timeline composition was ition-free college shifting. After education for One campus, one year: the University’s every high school 116 new faculty members hired. adoption of the graduate by 1975. What year was it? open admissions A $600 million program, the building program College could no President James Colston, the second do it quickly, to bring these students to a was launched and 1970 1976 1983 longer screen president of Bronx Community level where they could deal successfully by the early 1970s candidates for College, welcomed then Bronx with college requirements. It soon became Borough President Herman Badillo, apparent that the dropout rate was in- the City University admission; it left, and Porter Chandler, Chairman creasing. Community college students had expanded to 17 colleges. had to accept to full matriculated status of the Board of Higher Education in In 1969, the Board of Higher Education, all high school graduates who applied. June 1967. who did not drop out often had to spend influenced by continuing community and With better students promised automatic one or two semesters in overcoming their remedial handicaps and were, therefore, forced to extend their education well be- Reading Center, continued from page 6 parent readers themselves. And there has al major local foundations, among them yond the standard two years. been one other benefit from these pro- the Altman, Vincent Astor, Robert Bowne, Bowker left the University shortly after the planting, tending and baking. grams: some of our students have become Louis Calder, Chase, Diamond, Hasbro open admissions was instituted. The The Center for Intergenerational Read- interested in teaching as a profession. Children's, Morgan Stanley, Namm, Pinker- Board of Trustees selected Robert Kibbee, ing is also playing a key role in NYCTC's The Center for Intergenerational Read- ton, and Taconic Foundations. Corporate an administrator and professor from Ford- Americorps and America Reads programs. ing has enjoyed the vigorous support of underwriting has also come from Chemical ham University, to replace him as Chancel- Students in these public service programs New York City Technical College and sever- Bank, the Hunt Alternatives Fund, the So- lor. Kibbee continued to champion open indicate that they want to "make a positive ciety for the Prevention of Cruelty to Chil- admissions. In 1974, he addressed the impact on a child's life" and "want to con- dren, NYNEX, and Joseph E. Seagrams & BCC Faculty Senate and defended the pro- tribute in a positive way to the communi- Sons. Brooklyn Borough President Howard gram: “The purpose of open admissions is ty." Before being placed in a public school Golden and the West Side Day Nursery to bring young people in and try to do the or after-school site in the Fort Greene have also supported our work. best for them according to the resources area of Brooklyn, they attend three train- The presence of the Center for Inter- available. Some will go on to get degrees, ing sessions to prepare them to help chil- generational Reading at City Tech attests some won’t. But all will have benefitted to dren learn to read and enjoy reading. As a to the College's and the University's con- some extent.” result of this training, students gain exper- viction that literacy activities should tise in reading, reading games, and chil- begin in early childhood and that there is Four Decades of Achievement (206 dren's literature. no better role for teachers than to en- pages) is available from the BCC Foun- courage parents in developing their chil- dation in Gould Memorial Library. Pa- veryone benefits with Americorps and dren’s love for books. At the heart of the perback editions are $40, or free with America Reads: the children who re- E Center’s work is the richness of children's a $100 donation to the Foundation; ceive additional reading time and mentor- literature and the creation of new family hardcover are $60, or free with a $125 ing, the teachers who get help with individ- traditions based on the pleasure of being donation to the Foundation. For more ual children, and our college students, who, Parent Josefina Rosario doing her homework for able to tell a book not by its cover but by future reading to her children. Photo, George Lowe. information, call 718-289-5184. in the fullness of time, will be more skilled its contents. 11 CUNY in the Public Schools–Young Playwrights, continued from page 7 grade teacher at P.S. 207. “I never saw one class pay so much attention to anoth- A Trumped-Up “Carol” for Bronx Public Schools Dispute Resolution er class presentation.” Her students' play, "Come Over to My Institutes House," told the story of an alien visit. It icture this: wealthy businessman Ebenezer Scrooge is a Bronx native, but grew out of a study of homes around the Phe now resides at 725 Fifth Avenue (a.k.a. Trump Tower). His latest pro- at John Jay ject is buying up Times Square, closing homeless shelters, and making Christ- world, which introduced poetry, art, music he CUNY Dispute Resolution Consor- and folk dances from Mexico, Russia, mas an illegal holiday. The Bob Cratchit family is still living in the Bronx, and it’s the last holiday season of the millennium. Ttium, based at John Jay College, is Greece, and countries in Africa. “The lyrics offering three advanced Institutes in were poems we put to music,” she ex- Thus will Charles Dickens’ humane tale of redemption unfold later this fall as part of the continuing outreach of the Lovinger Theatre at Lehman College the near future designed for mediators plained, "and we wrote the dialogue to- with at least two years of experience gether. When the children performed, they to the Bronx public schools. Under the direction of the Lovinger’s producer, Professor Betsy Shevey, Lehman’s Department of Speech and Theatre will pre- and a minimum of 25 hours of mediation were proud, excited, and confident." training: The morning after the performance, one sent a series of school matinees of A New York Christmas Carol. Like the Bronx Young Playwrights Festival, this educational outreach has been designed of her students used poetry to express how Work Place 101: Labor & Employment he had changed from the start of the pro- to expand literacy and creative self-expression through the arts. Students from the Bronx High School of Science, De Witt Clinton High Basics for Mediators ject to its culmination: (Dec. 6, from 9 to 5) We had our show. School, and middle schools throughout Communi- ty School District 10 will have a chance to see I was so shy— Sexual Harassment Mediation I felt like I could fly. the production as well as attend workshops in their schools in which Shevey will share tech- (Jan. 12, from 1 to 5) niques for adapting stories for performance. hevey believes in Americans with Disabilities Act the power of this Students will read the original version of A S Christmas Carol and explore the process of re- Employment Mediation transformation. With (Jan. 13 & 14, 9 to 5; Jan. 15, 9 to 1) an extensive back- envisioning a classic in their own cultural terms. The cast will include current Lehman College ground in theater that All will take place at John Jay College, ranges from the New students, alumni who are working as professional actors, and, as Timmy Cratchit, a 12-year old 899 Tenth Avenue at 59th St. For more York Shakespeare information call Julie Ratcliff at Festival to interna- actor from Middle School 141. The real coup de théâtre will be Scrooge’s 212-237-8692 or email to tional productions, [email protected] she looks back at the dream-time. Multi-media effects will show the project as "a lesson in audience a visual montage of New York City exchange—the ex- from the 1940's to the 21st century as they fol- change of our experts’ low Scrooge's journey from selfish greed to lov- skills for the pleasure ing acceptance of himself and others. The Board of Trustees of watching young ghosts of Christmas Past, Present and Future The City University students walk onto a will appear to Scrooge as Oz’s Dorothy, Cher, professional stage for and Madonna. Also featured in the dream is an of New York the first time.” Pre- organ harvesting in which Scrooge is found to conceptions were also have no. . .well, you know. In addition to the school matinees, perfor- Herman Badillo exchanged, she says: Chairman “We reached a new mances for the Bronx community will be given at understanding of how the newly-renovated 500-seat Lovinger on De- P.S./M.S. 37 second-grader Jean Carlos Rodriguez rehearses a Benno C. Schmidt Jr. much we have in com- royal request to his daughter, played by Sierra Paige, to turn off cember 8 (3:30 p.m.), December 9, 10, and 11 mon—how we all the tube in “The Princess and the TV.” (8 p.m.), and December 12 (3 p.m.). Tickets are Vice-Chairman want to transcend our $5 for adults, $4 for seniors and children; they limitations and find ways to shape our ex- can be reserved by calling 718-960-8134. Satish K. Babbar pression so that others will listen.” John J. Calandra And, most importantly, the students ex- Kenneth Cook changed their hard work for the appreci- John Jay Conference, continued from page 2 Michael C. Crimmins ation of their parents and peers and for Alfred B. Curtis, Jr. to be from Brooklyn. The longest commut- in the Classroom. The next day’7s sessions their own pride and self-respect. Ronald J. Marino Geri Hayes in District 10 agrees. "The ing time recorded among this hearty group included examining and responding to stu- students will remember this event for was five hours. Apparently, passengers dent writing and creating assignments. Randy M. Mastro years." were encouraged to take alternate subway Participant evaluations of the seminar John Morning lines, but when they were taken to these were high, and three more are anticipated Kathleen M. Pesile Another group of Bronx students recommended lines by shuttle buses, the for the 1999-2000 academic year. George J. Rios will enjoy this same opportunity trains were not running either. August 26th was truly an auspicious and Nilda Soto Ruiz In the end, there were more participants fitting beginning for an initiative that has next spring, as the Second An- Jeffrey Wiesenfeld on hand than had been expected! And they been so eagerly awaited and welcomed. nual Young Playwrights Festival were unbelievably cheerful, enthusiastic The Office of Academic Affairs owes a debt expands and is presented at the Bernard Sohmer and eager to get on with WAC business. of thanks to the coordinators and facilita- Chairperson, University Faculty Senate Lovinger Theatre in June 2000. The first day’s three sessions were: In- tors who made it possible—and to all the For more information, contact Mizanoor Biswas troductions: Beliefs, Assumptions, Learn- participants, whose commitment to Writ- Chairperson, University Student Senate Betsy Shevey (718-960-7830 or ing, and Language; Responding to Read- ing Across the Curriculum was not damp- [email protected]). ings; and Using Writing-to-Learn Strategies ened by the torrents.

The Office of University Relations Letters or suggestions for The City University of New York Jay Hershenson future articles on topics of 535 E. 80th St. Vice Chancellor for New York, NY 10021 University Relations general interest to the CUNY community should be John Hamill addressed to Director of Media Relations CUNY Matters Editor: Gary Schmidgall 535 E. 80th St., 7th Floor New York, NY 10021 Managing Editor: Rita Rodin CUNY Matters is available on the CUNY home page at http://www.cuny.edu.

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