New Report Finds Major Improvements at CUNY

In June of 1999, the Mayor’s Task Force on the City University of New York, led by Benno Schmidt, released a study that criticized CUNY for high levels of remediation and low college graduation rates. Now, in June of 2001, a new report finds vast improvements in these areas thanks to the prescription laid out by Schmidt—increased collaboration between the public schools and higher education.

The Schmidt report described the system as “an institution adrift.” It found both the public schools and CUNY responsible for low student performance and called on them to work together to address these and other shortcomings.

The new report, “Building a Highway to Higher Ed,” issued by the Center for an Urban Future, a Manhattan-based think tank, finds that over the past 16 months, the city has become a national leader, implementing more collaborative programming than any other city of comparable size.

The report describes the new collaborative model as P-16 programming, an approach that links all levels of education from pre-kindergarten through college graduation or “the 16th grade.” In the past year and a half, New York has become one of the most active P-16 cities in the nation: making collaboration between the two school systems a major priority, revamping teacher education, aligning Regents tests with CUNY placement exams and creating eight Middle College High Schools based at CUNY campuses.

The report attributes much of the current success to vastly improved relations between the CUNY and public school chancellors. “The typical communication between CUNY and the public schools has been one of finger-pointing, and [it has] never approached the level of collaboration we have found this past year,” said Neil Scott Kleiman, director of the Center for an Urban Future. “These are two systems that have long been dominated by ego, hubris and politics. What we found is a major shift—an admission of shared responsibility for the city’s educational failings and a willingness to work together to fix it.”

While New York is ahead of the P-16 curve, there is much more to be done to make sure the city continues to implement this promising type of programming. The Center recommends the establishment of a P-16 funding compact, the inclusion of private colleges and universities and the monitoring of progress at the state level. #

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