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cuny.edu/news THE CITY UNIVERSITY OF NEW YORK • FOUNDED 1847 AS THE FREE ACADEMY

The “Decade of Science” initiativedeveloped by Chancellor MatthewGoldstein is “Jeffersonian” in its scope

and vision, and it embodies all the elementsrequired for success in an evolving globaleconomy, said John H.Marburger, III, ScienceAdviser to President GeorgeBush and Director of theU.S. Office of Science andTechnology Policy.

Addressing theNovember retreat ofCUNY’s Council ofPresidents, Marburger alsosaid that institutions devot-ed to scientific research—asthe University is—willincreasingly have to turn tothe private sector for thefunding needed to surviveand grow in a very compet-itive environment.

“CUNY’s plans for sci-ence development, itsDecade of Science, seem tome to fit very well into theevolving societal context,” Marburger said.

“These themes of the Advanced ScienceResearch Center, for example—photonics,structural biology, and so forth—they allfall in that area of Jeffersonian science thatcombines basic and applied research. Theyall fit priorities of the main sponsors ofuniversity-based research, including stateand federal agencies, and they appear todraw on regional and traditional strengthsin this region of the country…

“And perhaps as importantly, these areasand areas similar to them are particularlywell suited to CUNY’s educational mission.”

He was referring to the University’smission as a public institution of higherlearning devoted to providing the best inthe way of human resources and facilitiesto its student population, many of themimmigrants and the first in their families toattend college.

The Advanced Science Research Centerto which Marburger referred is aUniversity-wide complex that will houseprofessors and students from the various

campuses who are devoted to research inan expansive array of scientific areas.

The Center will be constructed on theSouth Campus of City College and is onlyone of a number of buildings being planned

at different campuses. Groundbreaking isexpected to take place in the coming year.

In announcing last year the beginning ofthe Decade of Science, ChancellorGoldstein said, “Modern facilities andequipment are essentialto our campuses, notonly to accomplish trulyinnovative research butalso to attract the bestfaculty researchers andto encourage and nur-ture the best students…That is why we will beinvesting more than$360 million to buildnew facilities or mod-ernize existing sciencebuildings at Hunter,Lehman, Queens, and City Colleges overthe next few years.”

Before his appointment to the ExecutiveOffice of the President, Marburger hadbeen President of the State University ofNew York at Stony Brook and, prior to that,

Chairman of the Physics Department andDean of the College of Letters, Arts andSciences at the University of SouthernCalifornia. He has also been Director ofBrookhaven National Laboratory on LongIsland.

When Marburger called CUNY’sDecade of Science plan “Jeffersonian,” heapparently was referring to the decision byPresident Thomas Jefferson to fund the1803 expedition of Meriwether Lewis andWilliam Clark, who explored the landsthat became the western section of theUnited States of America.

Scientists have said that Jefferson, inbacking the mission, was visionary in hisunderstanding that government could be asignificant sponsor of research.

Marburger said the scientific research atuniversities will take place outside therealm of shifting national politics. He saidthat “the Bush administration largelyembraced science priorities established inthe Clinton administration and built onthem.” He also told his audience that he isa Democrat, the only one “on the seniorstaff in the White House.”

Universities will have to be aware in thecoming years that the private sector willbe the principal source of growth in fund-ing for scientific research, which must be“interdisciplinary,” Marburger said.

“CUNY is seeking todevelop its strength inscience at a time whenscience has never beenmore highly valued bysociety and it canexpect support fromsociety for its endeavor,”he said.

“But sustainable suc-cess is going to requirea new business modelthat draws on a mix ofprivate and public funds

from a variety of sources…“CUNY’s success in its science develop-

ment venture is exceptionally importantand as you proceed you will find manypeople and organizations west of theHudson River who will want to help.”

Chancellor Matthew Goldstein (left) and John Marburger,Science Adviser to the White House.

University’s Science Plan is ‘Jeffersonian’ in Scope

“CUNY is seeking todevelop its strength inscience at a time whenscience has never beenmore highly valued.”

– John Marburger, ScienceAdviser to the White House

The CUNY Compact is Entering Its Second Year

The University is seeking financingfor year two of the CUNYCompact— the vehicle developed

by Chancellor Matthew Goldstein andapproved by the Board of Trustees tofinance the University’s Master Planpriorities.

This year’s request has as its centralthemes The Campaign for Student Success,The Decade of Science, and an EnterpriseResource Planning solution for theUniversity. (Please also see “TheChancellor’s Desk” column on page 2.)

The University is asking the state andcity for a total of $2.149 billion for thesenior and community colleges. Therequested amount for the senior colleges is

$1.588 billion, which is a $99.1 millionincrease over that of FY2006-07; and theamount for the community colleges is$561.3 million, a $31.5 million increaseover the previous year.

The University has pledged to raise$10.5million from philanthropic support andthrough productivity savings and adminis-trative restructuring.

The Compact developed by ChancellorGoldstein leverages resources from theUniversity’s key stakeholders, asking thestate and city to fund the University’smandatory costs, while calling on otherparties, particularly well-heeled alumni andothers in the business community, to makephilanthropic contributions.

Vice Chancellor for Budget and FinanceErnesto Malave has described the Compactas a way in which the state, city, Universityand outside community (which has astrong interest in CUNY’s success) “lever-age” each other by making contributionscommensurate with their role.

A main idea of the plan, ChancellorGoldstein said, is to keep tuition at man-ageably low levels, effectively enhancingthe quality of a CUNY education in theform of more full-time faculty members,strengthened student services and strongerprograms in the sciences and other areas.At the same time, suport for student finan-cial aid will be maintained so that no needystudent will be adversely impacted.

“Open the doors to all — let thechildren of the rich and the poor taketheir seats together and know of no

distinction save that of industry,good conduct, and intellect.”

— Townsend Harris, founder

DECEMBER 2006

Believing,Without Seeing

A blind student at New YorkCity College of Technology

runs in the New Yorkmarathons and lives her

life with confidenceand generosity thatshould inspire others.

Veterans ReturnHome and to College

An estimated 3,000 students around theUniversity are veterans, with large num-bers of them having served in Iraq, living

with destruction anddeath on a daily basis.

The campuses arebeefing up

efforts to helpthese stu-

dents.

Is There a Doctor In the (White) House?

Dr. Laurie Zephyrin, agraduate of City College’sSophie Davis School ofBiomedical Education,just completed a yearlong

White House Fellowship,an enormously com-

petitive nationalprogram.

MySpace is NowEverybody’s Space

MySpace and Facebook areso-called social networkingwebsites that havebecome an abidingpart ofcollegelife.

The University of DiversityCelebrates in Many Ways

Looking over the Events Calendar forDecember andJanuary, onecan see theunique diversityof CUNY,with perfor-mances andcelebrationsemanatingfrom aplethora ofculturaltraditions.

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Inside

ing and counsel-ing, services forstudents withdisabilities, andfacility upgrades.

As we looktoward our 2008 budget and the secondyear of the Compact, our goal is to buildon these investments and address impor-tant University-wide initiatives. Our cam-puses have indicated the need forstrengthened undergraduate and graduateprograms, expanded research opportunities,better academic and student support, andimproved information managementsystems and facilities. Several new effortsare directed toward these needs, including:• The Campaign for Student Success: Ledby the Office of Academic Affairs, the goalof the campaign is to improve studentachievement and to raise graduation ratesthrough innovative curricular and instruc-tional strategies.• The Decade of Science: The University’sfocus on increasing participation and profi-ciency in science, engineering, math, andtechnology includes building and modern-izing science facilities, investing in facultyand graduate students, and educating stu-dents to teach math and science in high-need schools.• Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP): TheCUNY ERP project will provide a new,University-wide suite of policies, processes,and information systems in order tostreamline current practices and help usbecome more efficient.

Through enhanced support from all ofthe University’s partners—includingincreased state and city aid, philanthropy,and productivity, and a modest tuitionincrease, with revenues used solely for pro-grammatic improvements—we will be ableto build on last year’s investments. We willalso further our goal of shifting the burdenof meeting our operating costs from stu-dents to government.

In conjunction with the Compact, the2008 capital budget request comprises newbuildings, renovations, and upgrades thatwill allow us to meet our long-term aca-demic initiatives. These include the CUNY-wide Advanced Science Research Center,science facilities at City, Lehman, andQueens colleges, and the replacement ofFiterman Hall at Borough of ManhattanCommunity College.

Our students and faculty deserve facili-ties, programs, and services that match theiraspirations and abilities. Through theCUNY Compact, we can truly invest intheir futures.

2 CUNY MATTERS — December 2006

Manfred PhilippChairperson,Faculty Senate

Robert Ramos, Jr.Chairperson,Student Senate

Benno C. Schmidt Jr.ChairmanValerie L. Beal Joseph J. Lhota

Philip Berry Randy M. Mastro

John S. Bonnici Hugo M. Morales

Wellington Z. Chen Kathleen M. Pesile

Kenneth Cook Carol Robles-Román

Rita DiMartino Marc V. Shaw

Freida Foster-Tolbert Jeffrey Wiesenfeld

ChancellorMatthew GoldsteinSec. of the Board of Trustees and SeniorVice Chancellor for University RelationsJay HershensonUniversity Director for Media RelationsMichael ArenaEditor Ron HowellWriters Gary Schmidgall, Rita RodinPhotographer André BecklesGraphic Design Gotham Design, NYCArticles in this and previous issues are available at cuny.edu/news.Letters or suggestions for future stories may be sent to the Editorby email to [email protected]. Changes ofaddress should be made through your campus personnel office.

BOARDOFTRUSTEESThe City University of New York

tude, are sold at nearly a dozen hip Man-hattan and Brooklyn boutiques, and she’sgetting orders from around the country.

This summer, CUNY Matters profiledfamilies with multiple CUNY gradu-ates. I was struck by the story of

Norma Smiley, an immigrant from Jamaicawho graduated from Medgar EversCollege’s licensed practical nurse programin June. Three sons are also CUNY gradu-ates. “City University got me through allthis,” she said. “They really pushed me andprovided help and support. They do every-thing to keep you focused.”

Norma Smiley’s story is a reminder thata great university is a vehicle for aspira-tion, facilitating learning and discovery andchanging students’ futures. It reinforcedmy belief that to maintain that criticalrole, CUNY must invest in its own future.

That’s why we introduced the CUNYCompact last year, a new approach tofunding the University. The goal of theCompact is to finance the academic goalsand priorities of the University by leverag-ing resources from the University’s keystakeholders: New York State and NewYork City, which would fund mandatorycosts, plus 20 percent of our investmentprogram; the University itself, contributingthrough improved productivity and effi-ciencies; friends, alumni, and donors, sup-porting an increased emphasis onphilanthropy; and our students, assistingthrough enrollment growth and modest,predictable tuition increases.

This shared partnership enables us toaddress the long-term goals developed withour campuses every four years for the state-mandated Master Plan—such as adding full-time faculty, enhancing research, andexpanding library resources. The Compactalso aims to shift the burden of meeting theUniversity’s operating costs from studentsto government. Rather than relying onlarge, unexpected tuition increases duringeconomic downturns, the Compact propos-es smaller, periodic tuition increases that donot exceed the rate of inflation. In addition,the maintenance of full student financial aidis required for the success of the plan, sothat no student is denied the ability to con-tinue his or her education.

Last year, we proposed the CUNYCompact to the University’s constituencies,including lawmakers, and we have begun tosee the results of this fresh approach tofinancing. Increased funding from both thestate and the city for the 2007 fiscal yearenabled us to cover all mandatory costincreases—for example, the costs associatedwith collective bargaining—and to begin aninvestment program.

These investments include additionalmoney for full-time faculty, libraries, advis-

Our Compact Has an Impact

Fiterman Hall, the 15-story building bad-ly damaged in the September 11, 2001,attacks on the World Trade Center, is

set to be transformed into a state-of-the-artvertical campus, under the direction of PeiCobb Freed & Partners Architects.

The new Fiterman will boast a brickfaçade with metal and glass inset panelsthat will serve as a symbol of the rebirth ofLower Manhattan. It will also be an enor-mously important acquisition for Boroughof Manhattan Community College, theCUNY campus that has been mourningFiterman’s loss over the past five year.

Chancellor Matthew Goldstein said thatCUNY and BMCC, led by PresidentAntonio Perez, have been working closelywith community groups and governmentagencies, and will continue to do so. It ishoped that work can begin early in 2007.

“The new Fiterman Hall will greatlyenhance the scope and quality of educa-tional, cultural, and community programsoffered by the College,” the Chancellorsaid. It will house 53 classrooms, 21 com-puter labs, 129 faculty offices and a studentlounge.

Goldstein explained that the process,which will begin after the hoped forapproval by state and federal oversightagencies, is a long one.

“As we prepare for the remediation anddemolition of the existing Fiterman Hall,work is also proceeding on the design of anew building for the site,” the Chancellorsaid in a statement in November.

“Pei Cobb Freed & Partners recentlycompleted the design development phaseand is now preparing construction docu-ments. Construction of the new classroombuilding is scheduled to begin in 2008. We

anticipate a construction period of approxi-mately two years.”

“Remediation” of the existing buildingrefers to its decontamination, removal ofany potentially harmful debris or materials.CUNY, together with the DormitoryAuthority of the State of New York (DAS-NY), selected PAL Environmental SafetyCorp. to perform the remediation anddeconstruction.

In October, PAL submitted designs forscaffolding erection operations to the U.S.Environmental Protection Agency for reviewby the EPA and other regulatory agencies.

Work will begin only after the expectedapproval of the government agencies.

To keep the community informed aboutthe progress of work at Fiterman, theUniversity and BMCC have launched ane-mail newsletter, “Fiterman News: KeepingOur Community Informed.”

Those interested in that or other aspectsof the deconstruction and rebuilding processcan visit www.bmcc.cuny.edu/fitermannews.

At the website, visitors can view a slideshow of the architect’s renderings of theplanned new facility and can keep informedabout upcoming events related to the pro-ject, as well as read official documents.

Special concern will be taken withrespect to the chance that human remainsare in the area, a possibility highlighted bythe discovery of scores of body parts inareas around Ground Zero in October.

“We are working with the Office of theChief Medical Examiner to make diligentefforts to perform new searches,” Goldsteinsaid. “[A] meeting was held at the site withboth the chief Medical Examiner’s Officeand the City’s Office of Disaster Manage-ment Operations to discuss search plans

Sarah Morgan has a good thing going.Her leather handbags, belts and cuffs,all accessories with a New York atti-

Sarah Morgan, with her leather bags and other items that she designs. Morgan is one of a number of small entrepreneurs beingassisted by LaGuardia's "incubator program," called NY Designs.

‘Incubator’at LaGuardia, with Assembly Speaker Silver’s Help, Assists Local Businesses

THECHANCELLOR’SDESKFiterman Will Symbolize the Rebirth of Ground Zero and of the BMCC Campus

and I can’t wait to use the workroom. Butit’s more than just the rent. It’s the psycho-logical impact of being here. As a designer,you often exist in a vacuum, and here Ihave quick access to other designers andother resources.”

Jeff Goodman of jGoodDesign, a seven-year-old lighting designcompany that sells todesigners and architects,knows exactly whatMorgan means. “There isa sense of communityand the encouragementto collaborate,” he says.“Just today I ran into oneof my co-tenants andheard about a great idea.”

That synergy, NYDesigns director MaryHoward says, is what theincubator is all about.

“In one place, design-ers get importantservices—the chance todevelop business skillsthrough adult-educationclasses in everything frommodel making to greendesign, shared facilitieslike the conference rooms and prototypeworkshop and access to a list of hard-to-find professionals like accountants andtrademark lawyers they may want to hire,”she says.

The $6.1-million center, which officiallyopened in October and has 19 studios thatrent for $260 to $1,500 per month, isfunded by state and federal grants—$5 mil-lion from Restore New York, $1 millionfrom the U.S. Department of Commerceand $150,000 from the U.S. Department

of Housing andUrban Develop-ment.

The project wassponsored by theCUNY EconomicDevelopmentCorp. in coopera-tion with thecollege.

New YorkAssembly SpeakerSheldon Silver, whowas instrumental inthe Assembly’s allo-cation of fundingfor the center, said,“NY Designs is pro-viding the criticalsupport servicesand access to capi-tal resources neces-sary to accelerate

the growth of promising young companies,building community and jobs for NewYorkers.”

NY Designs has been in the works since2002, when the Assembly set aside a $7.5-

million grant to begin the initial phase ofthe incubator network. “NY Designs is acritical part of CUNY’s outreach to thecommunity,” Chancellor MatthewGoldstein said. “It’s an opportunity forCUNY to become a vital part of the localeconomy by offering training to designersand their prospective employees. We aredeeply appreciative of the strong support ofSpeaker Silver and Rep. Catherine Nolan ofthe 37th District and the New York StateAssembly, who have made this all possible.”

NY Designs is LaGuardia’s latest link tothe local business community. TheLaGuardia Urban Center for EconomicDevelopment provides professional trainingand business support programs to business-es in western Queens and its SmallBusiness Development Center offers freebusiness technical assistance to startup andestablished entrepreneurs.

“Chancellor Goldstein has established avision for the City University of New Yorkthat uses the intellectual capital present inour colleges to support economic develop-ment and job creation,” says CUNY PresidentGail Mellow. “This is terrific for our students,our faculty and our community.”

It also is terrific for Morgan, Goodmanand the other design tenants who have tak-en up residence in NY Designs. An enthusi-astic Morgan says, “I intend to makeeenamaria a lifestyle brand. I’m going tointroduce chandeliers next. What I reallyneed now are investors.”

CUNY MATTERS — December 2006 3

The 31-year-old entrepreneur is set toexpand her two-year-old business—she hasplans for her bags to take Japan by storm

next year—so shesigned on as one ofthe first tenants inNY Designs, theworld’s largest “incu-bator” for designers.

With its 12-foot-high ceilings, glasswalls and enormouswindows, the34,000-squareloft-like space atLaGuardia Com-munity College, shesays, is the perfectplace to nurture hercompany, which shecalls “eenamaria.”

And it is herewhere her businessdreams will hatchand then grow.

“The rent—$550per month—is negli-gibly cheap, and I’mnot just paying forfloor space. I haveaccess to three beau-tiful conferencerooms, and this willhelp with the imageI want to project,

and inspections.”The Chancellor added, “The safety and

well being of residents, our students andfaculty, business and community members,and the families of the 9/11 victims is ofparamount importance to the Universityand the College.”

Located at 30 West Broadway, FitermanHall suffered structural damage from theroof to the basement when tons of debrisrained down from the 47-story World TradeCenter 7 following the terrorist attacks of9/11. The building was just two weeks shyof completing a $64 million renovation,including a state-of-the-art academic centerand library when the attacks occurred,heavily damaging its south side.

Miles and Shirley Fiterman donatedFiterman Hall to Manhattan CommunityCollege in 1993. Erected in 1959, it wasformerly an office building.

Funding for the remediation, decon-struction and rebuilding of the new struc-ture is coming from the state and city, theLower Manhattan Development Corpora-tion, the September 11 Fund and a proper-ty insurance settlement. The project budgetfrom the city and state is $202 million.

In addition to the classrooms, offices,labs and lounge, plans call for a 14-storystructure that will offer escalators to servethe lower floors and 12 high-speed eleva-tors. The new building will contain approx-imately 391,000 gross square feet.

On the ground floor, it will feature acafé and two interconnected art galleries,the Fiterman Galleries. Most floors containa combination of classrooms, computerlabs and faculty offices, as well as studentlounges, many within two-story glass“atriums.”

General education classrooms will beconcentrated on the lower floors. Theupper floors will house specialized depart-ments such as accounting, business, com-puter information system and art andmusic. A conference center is planned for

the top two floors.Fiterman will have two covered entries:

one on the corner of Greenwich Street andPark Place, anticipated to be the mainentrance, and a second one on BarclayStreet, facing a new park in front of 7

small entrepreneurs being

Assembly Speaker Silver’s Help, Assists Local Businesses

‘There is asense of community

and the encouragementto collaborate,’ says

Jeff Goodman,owner of a budding

lighting designcompany,

speaking of hisexperience atLaGuardia

‘incubator’ program.

Architectural rendering of proposed Fiterman Hallsouth atrium. The architect on the project is PeiCobb Freed & Partners Architects.

At right:Architectural rendering of proposed

Fiterman Hall exterior.

Rebirth of Ground Zero and of the BMCC Campus

World Trade Center.Borough of Manhattan Community

College serves more than 19,000 degree-seeking students and an additional 19,000in continuing and professional educationcourses.


from the Achilles Track Club, six fellowrunners who helped her stay on course,avoid collisions, and find water during themarathon; and the Human ServicesDepartment and Student Support office atCity Tech, which aids more than 30 stu-dents with visual disabilities.

She very much feels the pain the herhome country is still suffering. “For morethan three generations, the people ofAfghanistan have lived with war. We wereraised in a very hard situation, so we are

very hard-head-ed andstubborn, wealways try tofigure out a waypast the obsta-cles. And peoplestill have hopethat one daythere will bepeace—I amstill hoping.”

Nodrat wantsto make a con-tribution to thewell-being of herhomeland, par-ticularly its lessfortunate citi-zens. She’sworking to cre-ate a foundationto help blindwomen and chil-dren inAfghanistan.“My job is toraise my voice,”she said. “I hopeto encouragesighted peopleto support orga-nizations thathelp women andthe disabled.One person

alone can’t achieve very much. But manyvoices together can make a difference.”

After she gets her associate’s degree,Nodrat plans to continue at City Tech for abachelor’s degree in human services, special-izing in mental and physical disabilities. Thenshe wants to earn a master’s and a Ph.D.from Hunter College, with the ultimate goalof becoming a clinical psychologist.

Her reason for wanting to be a psychol-ogist only reveals the extraordinary quali-ties of her inner being.

“The person who attacked me was adrug user and a disturbed teenager,” shesaid. “She needed counseling; if she wasnormal she wouldn’t have done this terri-ble thing. My personality is, I want to helppeople, and I’m very good at it. From thebottom of my heart, I forgive that girl whoattacked me. I have no anger ordisappointment: she was sick, what do youexpect from a sick person? I hope she willrecover and become a healthy person.”

Nodrat was a little disappointed withher time of 7:39:25 in this year’smarathon; she’d hoped to finish in six anda half hours. Given the tenacity andcourage she’s displayed at each twist andturn in her challenging life’s road, it seemsvery likely that she’ll eventually achievethis goal. It hardly matters, though,because in a very real sense Nooria Nodrathas won every race she ever entered.

to total blindness.“They supported me in every way; I am

so proud of them,” she said.Now 25 and 22, both are attending col-

lege and doing well. “The hardest thing forme to live with,” their mother said, “is thatI never got to physically see them growinto adults.”

But Nodrat is not the sort of personwho wastes time on regrets. She enrolledat City Tech in 2002. Her initial progresswas slow, as she suffered the consequences

of the attack. In 2003 she developed aninfection that caused pain so severe sheultimately decided to have both eyesremoved. Then she fell in the subway ayear later and broke her knee.

“Because of my loss of vision, I was veryunstable,” she explains, “so my early yearsat school were hard; I lost two semesters.But I got myself back on track, and nowI’m fine.”

She maintains a 3.7 grade point averageand has received four scholarships, includ-ing two from the National Federation ofthe Blind and a Benjamin H. NammScholarship from City Tech. She’s presi-dent of the NFB’s NewYork Student Division, working to helpblind high school and college studentsunderstand their rights and maximize theirpotential.

Additionally, she’s an active member ofthe Women’s Association of New York andhas worked as a volunteer at the CatholicGuild for the Blind, the Jewish Guild forthe Blind, and the Department of MusicTherapy at the Queens Center for Progress.

Nodrat lives in Long Island City and inher “spare time” enjoys karate (in whichdiscipline she has an advanced yellowbelt), yoga, music, writing short stories andceramics.

Among those Nodrat fervently thanksare her guide dog, Yahoo; her support team

Nooria Nodrat completed her sixthNew York City Marathon thisNovember, an impressive feat for

any 45-year-old woman, let alone onewho’s totally blind.

In a sense, you could say that Nodrathas been running marathons her entire life.When she receives her associate’s degreefrom the New York City College ofTechnology at the end of this semester, shewill have in hand yet another confirmationof her irrepressible inner spirit.

At 16, backin Kabul, thecapital ofAfghanistan,Nodrat enteredan arrangedmarriage with aman 21 yearsher senior. Inher native coun-try, womenwere expectedto besubservient,Nodrat boretwo childrenand learnedBraille to assisther husbandand eldestbrother, both ofwhom wereblind.

But she alsojoined one ofAfghanistan’sfledgling wom-en’s organiza-tions, founded inthe hopeful dayswhen the nationseemed to bemodernizing.

“I went doorto door in Kabuland talked towomen about how important it was to beeducated, because most women didn’thave an education. Even when I was in mycountry, I wasn’t the type of woman tostay behind; I always tried to forwardmyself,” Nodrat said, in English that ischarmingly idiosyncratic.

“I’m a very independent person,” sheadded.

Nodrat needed all that independenceduring the painful era of Afghanistan’s civilwar. Her brother was abducted and exe-cuted by Islamic extremists in 1988.Several years later, her husband was killedby a terrorist bomb. She fled to the UnitedStates with her parents in 1991, but shehad to leave behind her son and daughter,then only nine and six. Five long yearspassed before she was able to bring themto America.

“Women in my country have to be very,very patient,” she said

Then, just three months after her chil-dren arrived, came the fateful incident inthe subway. Nodrat was attacked by amentally disturbed teenager, who threwher to the floor and repeatedly punchedher in the head. Her retinas, already weak-ened by glaucoma, were destroyed, andshe lost her sight. Her children, themselvesgrappling with the difficult adjustment tolife in a new country, helped her endurefive surgeries and the painful adjustment

Fish Receives Fulbright

Cheryl J Fish, Associate Professor ofEnglish at Borough of Manhattan

Community College, has been awardeda Fulbright Scholar grant to lecture andconduct research in EnvironmentalJustice and North American Studies atUniversity of Tampere in Finland duringthe 2006-2007 academic year.

The focus of Fish’s lectures will beon eco-criticism and environmentalpolicies, through the examination ofAmerican novels and films.

“What I really want to see is if litera-ture really has the power to change us,”said Fish. “Does fiction—or films—thatpoint out the problems with the envi-ronment make us want to becomeactivists or do they just make us laughat activism?”

Fish explained that the environmenthas been “the focus of my work here inNew York.” She added, “I’m very interest-ed in learning about the environmentalmovements in Finland, especially in thetown of Tampere.”

Grant for Queensborough

Queensborough Community Collegeis extending congratulations to Dr.

Patricia Schneider, Professor ofBiological Sciences and Geology.

Schneider was principal investigatorin the winning of a new $561,653three-year grant from the U.S. Depart-ment of Education’s Minority Scienceand Engineering Improvement Program(MSEIP).

The grant will be used to launch anddevelop a program to recruit under-represented minority students into thesciences, providing them also withopportunities for scientific research.

The idea furthermore is to ensurethat there is enhanced faculty mentor-ing for those students.

Grove Wins Award

The Department of BiomedicalEngineering of The Grove School of

Engineering at The City College ofNew York has received a five-year, $2.5million grant from the NationalInstitutes of Health.

The funds, awarded by the NationalHeart, Lung and Blood Institute(NHLBI), will be used to create a“national urban model for minoritybiomedical engineering education.”

“The programs we are supportingthrough this grant will enable The GroveSchool of Engineering to become the goldstandard for minority biomedical engi-neering education…,” said Dr. SheldonWeinbaum, CCNY DistinguishedProfessor of Biomedical Engineering andPrincipal Investigator on the grant.

During each year of the grant,CCNY will award NIH Scholarships,which will cover full tuition and sum-mer research stipends, to as many as 20high-achieving undergraduate biomedi-cal engineering majors from underrepre-sented groups.

The Grove School of Engineering atThe City College of New York, former-ly the CCNY School of Engineering, isthe only public engineering schoolwithin New York City. It offersBachelors, Masters and Ph.D. degrees.

City Tech student Nooria Nodrat, who is blind and runs marathons, speaking to Karen Matthews, anAssociated Press reporter, after Nodrat finished the recent New York marathon.

FACULTYHONORS Hurdling Obstacles, She Wins Every Single Race


NOTED&QUOTED

Hostos Hosts a Renowned Artist,and Gains a Masterpiece

Internationally distinguished PuertoRican artist Antonio Martorell, a

Visiting Scholar at HostosCommunity College this

fall, plans to leavesomething perma-

nent at the Bronxcampus: a multi-disciplinary art-work based onLa Plena, atraditionalPuerto Ricanmusical genre.

“I will createa permanent

exhibit at Hostosabout La Plena

Immortal and theDance of Death,” a genre

in vogue during the MiddleAges and the Renaissance, said

Martorell.His work will be a marriage between old and new

traditions, an artistic rendering of the vibrant culturalexpressions that the New World of the Americas hasgiven to the Old World of Europe.

“My concept is to present the Dance of Death in a Caribbean context, specificallythrough our Puerto Rican Plena,” using “colorful and rhythmic prints portraying, as inthe original Dance of Death, a cross-section of contemporary society.”

The prints will be created from octagonal and diamond-shaped surfaces display-ing woodcuts and dry points on copper, and printed on paper from Asia, Europe andLatin America. Stanzas will also be engraved in the wood and printed.

Martorell, a painter, graphic artist, writer and media personality, was Resident Artistat the Colegio Universitario de Cayey, Puerto Rico. His publications include La Piel dela Memoria (The Skin of Memory). He also writes for El Vocero, a Puerto Rican daily, co-hosts a radio program and appears weekly on WIPR-TV, a government station.

It is rare, on a team of strong, veterantennis players, to have a freshman who

dominates the court as Evgeniya Kim does.Kim—who plays for Hunter College

and is also a CUNYHonors College stu-dent—finished therecently ended sea-son with a perfect8-0 record in singlesplay.

Her team, theHunter Hawks, wontheir seventhstraight CUNYACchampionship.

In some ways, hersuccess waspredictable. Kimstarted playing atthe age of nine, backin Uzbekistan, andby 14 was compet-ing on an interna-tional level,representing her national team andtraveling through Asia.

But in other ways, Kim’s recentaccomplishments seem like a triumphover great odds.

In Uzbekistan, her family had roughtimes. As a descendant of Korean immi-grants, Evgeniya was “pelted withstones and spat on while walking toschool…” an October Daily News arti-

The Kim family was eventually releasedand went to live in Flushing, Queens. Theywere granted political asylum.

Evgeniya struggled mightily to adjust toher new environment, and she showedgreat character in doing so. “Since I wasthe only one that spoke any English athome, I had to do everything,”explained Kim. “I missed a lot in myearly days. Where ever my family wentI had to be there.”

She played tennis at Cardozo HighSchool, building confidence and gainingthe respect of new friends and associ-ates. At Hunter, where she fell into hergame and her studies with great energyand determination, tennis coach MelKerper is thrilled to have her.

“She’s a coach’s dream,” Kerper said.The Hunter Women’s Tennis team

again had a dominating and successfulseason, with a strong roster of players.In addition to Evgeniya, the teamincluded Monica Calungcagin,Antigone Tzakis, Sarah El-Edlibi, JaneNassisi, Rachael Clouden, KristinaCastro, Louise Hollander and CarolynJones.

cle reported.In 2002, she, her parents and two sib-

lings arrived at Kennedy Airport, hoping tobegin to new life of freedom and opportu-

nity. But she was “left to sleep onthe floor of a holding cell…alongwith the rest of her family” andwent on to spend “seven months ina federal immigration shelter inLeesport, Pa., with bars on the win-dows and guards everywhere…”

Evgeniya Kim,relaxed, and (atright) intense onthe court.

Nunez Publishes Her SixthNovel to Wide Acclaim

It could be said that Medgar Evers’s repu-tation as a place where great literature is

created and debated rests, to a fair degree,on the shoulders of Elizabeth Nunez.

In October, Nunez traveled across theBrooklyn Bridge and up the river to theCUNY Central Office, where she readfrom her sixth and latest novel, Prospero’sDaughter.

Beginning with her childhood inTrinidad—the formerly British nation in theCaribbean that is the setting for Prospero’sDaughter—and continuing through heryears in the United States earning a bache-lor’s, master’s and Ph.D., Nunez has consid-ered Shakespeare her light and inspiration.

The plot of Prospero’s Daughter is basedon The Tempest.

Selma Botman,CUNY’sExecutive ViceChancellor forAcademic Affairsand UniversityProvost, organizedthe evening eventcelebratingNunez’s latestwork, along withAssistant DeanCheryl Williams.

“CUNY ishome to some ofthe most accomplished writers in thecountry today, and even in the world ofhighly acclaimed novelists, ElizabethNunez stands out,” Botman said of Nunez,a CUNY Disting-uished Professor and pastwinner of the American Book Award.

If Medgar Evers owes much of it reputa-tion as a literary stronghold to Nunez, thenNunez says owes much to John OliverKillens, the late Medgar Evers professorwith whom she founded the National BlackWriters Conference two decades ago.

In addition to Nunez, Medgar Eversboasts a number of successful writers,including Jamaica-born novelist ColinChanner. Professor Brenda M. Greeneis Executive Director of the college’sCenter for Black Literature.

City Tech Builds Program, andConstruction Mavens Come

Scaffolding, excavated lots and construc-tion cranes are as ubiquitous to New

York as yellow cabs and street vendorshawking knockoff handbags. Withconstruction so crucial to the city’s econo-my, new technologies and safety issues area major concern.

Enter the new Academy ofConstruction Education and Safety(ACES), at the Division of ContinuingEducation at New York City College ofTechnology.

Aimed at developing professionals inconstruction and general industry, theAcademy, with its training partner,American Safety Consultants LLC, offerssafety and certificate programs, credentialsrecognized by the industry as well as certi-fications in response to new local laws.

Courses at the downtown Brooklyncampus are grouped for OSHA (federalOccupational Safety and HealthAdministration) certifications, but can betaken individually by those with specificworkforce interests. Health and Safety PlanDevelopment, Fire Safety and SupportedScaffold Training given in both Spanishand English, are among the offerings.

For information visit www.citytech.cuny.edu/academics/continuinged or call718-552-1170.

Got Crime? Get John Jay’sDavid Kennedy On the Line

In Rochester, murders ofyoung African-

American males plum-meted 70 percent. InBoston, homicides ofthose 24 and youngerwere cut by two-thirds. Inthe once drug- and crime-ridden town of HighPoint, N.C., there wasn’t agun assault for a year.

Such statistics, wrought by the innova-tive crime-control strategies of DavidKennedy, have elevated the John JayCollege criminologist and head of itsCenter for Crime Prevention and Controlto miracle-worker status, and made himone of CUNY’s most sought-after experts.

With both the man and his resultsdescribed as “brilliant,” “stunning” and “cut-ting-edge,” it’s no surprise municipalitiessuch as Washington, D.C. and Oakland,Calif., have turned to Kennedy for help.Or that Kennedy’s commentary is foundthese days in publications ranging fromThe New York Times and Washington Postto overseas papers.

“I’m interested in results,” says Kennedy,who was recruited from Harvard University’sKennedy School of Government by John JayPresident Jeremy Travis in 2005.

The centerpiece of Operation Ceasefire,which Kennedy developed in 1995, is the“call-in,” in which offenders are confront-ed—by law enforcement officials andmembers of the community—with “thetruth” about violence, its consequences andalternatives.

“David Kennedy is a hero in this com-munity and if I was the Queen, I’d givehim a knighthood,” said High Point PoliceChief James Feally, in an article by TomFurlong, who profiled Kennedy in a specialmagazine, John Jay, last year.

The Center has partnered with thestate’s Division of Criminal JusticeServices to address crime problems in 15upstate jurisdictions.

AntonioMartorell, who is a visitingscholar at Hostos this fall,with a signature piece.

David Kennedy

Elizabeth Nunez

Defeating Tennis Opponents, and Other Foes ThatLife Has Thrown Against Her

“I just have one day off when I sleep—otherwise I like to stay busy.”

Luna said he is grateful that he has beenable to cope reasonably well—somethinghe knows other return-ing soldiers from hisunit have had a toughtime with. He’s heardstories of soldiers whohave drinking or drugproblems or scrapeswith the law because ofdomestic battery cases.

“A lot of the guysdidn’t come back witha lot of gas,” Luna said.For some them, I think,

the war was the straw thatbroke the camel’s back.”

Luna said he learned valu-able lessons about his ownresiliency and his ability to geta lot accomplished in a day.He’s considering going to for amaster’s degree, but he said hemay just try to get a job aftergraduation, and go to gradschool later.

Meanwhile, either on campusor outside recruiting stationslocated near the colleges, mili-tary recruiters are attempting toentice other students into ser-vice, stressing the material bene-fits, such as pay and tuitionassistance, as well as the pridethat many members feel inwearing their country’s uniform.

On a recent weekday, a U.S.Army recruiter, Staff Sgt.Rashid Keitt, was atKingsborough CommunityCollege trying to interest stu-dents in signing up. Around thecountry, recruiters have been

having a difficult time getting young menand women to enlist, in large part becauseof the Iraq war and its high death toll, nowapproaching 3,000 American servicemen

and servicewomen.Keitt conceded

that the war hasmade recruitingtougher and hesaid he encountersresistance fromstudents and theirparents. “They justthink if you jointhe Army you willbe sent straight tothe war in Iraq,”

said Keitt, a 25-year-old from Queens.Keitt says it’s not true that enlistees will

necessarily end up in Iraq or Afghanistan.“…I’ve served for seven years and I’ve beento neither,” he said.

But nearby was Jesse Campbell, a 22-year-old student, who was more than a lit-tle skeptical.

Campbell, a freshman from Carnasie,joined the Marines a few months after9/11, angry over the loss of a friend whowas killed in the World Trade Centerattack. Campbell remained on active dutyfrom 2002 through this year, and he wasnever called to Iraq or to Afghanistan dur-ing that time. He stayed stateside as part ofdetail working as HAZMAT responders forthe Department of Homeland Security.

And so he was able to enroll atKingsborough, receiving $1,184 toward histuition and expenses under the GI bill.

But Campbell said that last month hereceived an email from the Marines thathas been causing him great concern, as itadvises him of his continuing obligation tothe military.

According to the contract he signed atage 17 he has to serve four years active


who havereturned frommilitary duty. Inone of manybonding activi-ties, the vetsmake annualtrips toWashington, D.C. to take partin MemorialDay servicesthere. From timeto time theygather for enjoy-ment and tolend each otheremotional sup-port.

Sgt. ArielLuna, a senior atBrooklynCollege, wholives in StarrettCity, joined theU.S. ArmyNational Guardin 1999. In2002, his unitbased inJamaica, Queenswas called toactive duty andLuna spent 11monthsin Iraq.

On his tour, Luna often worked 18 hoursa day, 6 days a week, driving trucks tomaintain supply routes in and out ofBaghdad for three weeks at a time. On thefourth week, he worked guard duty—abreak considering it was only a 12-hour day.

“It was one hell of an experience,” saidLuna, a radio and television major. “Everyday something happened…. But comparedto other units, we were lucky. We only lostone guy. We had twenty injured.”

Since his return home, Luna has thrownhimself into his work as student, at aninternship, and in two part-time jobs.

“Basically, I like to fill my time withsome kind of activity,” said the 25-year-old.

There are an estimated3,000 veterans of theUnited States militaryattending CUNY col-leges, and many of themhave served in Iraq,putting their lives at risk

in a way that five years ago—before theevents of September 11, 2001—seemedalmost unimaginable.

Some of them had been college studentsbefore putting on their uniforms, and sotheir presence now on campus is like ahomecoming, albeit one with special stress-es related to their experiences facing deathand violence in a war-ripped country.

University administrators and theircounterparts at the campuses have beenattempting over the past year to puttogether special programs for the veterans,recognizing their unique backgrounds andtheir special needs—financial and psycho-logical—as they attempt to resume a mea-sure of normalcy.

At Kingsborough Community Collegein Brooklyn, Dean of Students NormanToback said he anticipates that many thou-sands of veterans will be returning to themetropolitan area in the next couple ofyears. He says that Kingsborough is tryingto beef up its counseling and other servicesfor them, as a way of enticing them tocome and then helping them to succeedonce they are there.

“We anticipate there will be 10,000returning veterans in the metro area in thenext couple of years,“ Toback said. “Andmany of them, we anticipate, will want toavail themselves of the educational bene-fits that they earned as military. So we’reincreasing our recruitment and other ser-vices… ”

Among the special services being devel-oped at Kingsborough is “a complete one-stop service center,” where the vets canreceive health screening, personal counsel-ing and advice about their benefits as vet-erans.

Over at Brooklyn College, ClaudetteGuinn, Coordinator of Student Affairs andVeterans Services, Brooklyn College, hasbeen especially active in helping students

The Rev. Rafael Corniel calls former Borough of Manhattan CommunityCollege student Hai Ming Hsia, who was killed in Iraq this summer, as a

symbol of multi-cultural New York.Hsia, serving as an Army Specialist, was on patrol in the Iraq city of Ramadi

when his vehicle was hit by a roadside bomb. He was 37.Several years ago Hsia had put his dreams of finishing college on hold, as he

enlisted in the military to support his growing family.Corniel, a priest at St. James Roman Catholic Church in lower Manhattan, told

CUNY Matters that Hsia was “tri-cultural,” and spoke English like a proud NewYorker, but also spoke Spanish and Chinese fluently. His mother was Puerto Ricanand his father Chinese.

“It was like losing the Triborough Bridge,” Corniel said.CUNY’s Veterans Affairs website (www.cuny.edu/veterans) tells visitors about

Hsia, saying he “was a real New Yorker, a native of lower Manhattan’s Chinatown.” Hsia “tried hishand at college, attending the Borough of Manhattan Community College, just a short walk fromhis neighborhood.”

Then, in “2002, a year after the fall of the nearby twin towers, Hai Min Hsia’s wife, Yanisse,gave him the news that they were going to have a child. Realizing that his security job would notprovide for three, he suspended his college goals and enlisted in the U.S. Army,” we are told.

The “Fallen Heroes” link on the website pays homage also to four other former CUNY studentspreviously killed while serving in Iraq. They are: Army Spec. Segun Frederick Akintade (New YorkCity College of Technology); Army Pfc. Francis C. Obaji (College of Staten Island); Army Pfc.James E. Prevete (Queens College); and Army Pfc. Min Soo Choi (John Jay College).

A Commemoration of ‘Fallen Heroes’

Former BMCCstudent HaiMing Hsia,killed as aserviceman inIraq.

Abdul Montaser (left), who was in the Marines and served in Iraq, is now studying at Kingsborough Community College.He's pictured here on a fall day, chatting with U.S. military recruiters who were at the campus trying to get students to enlist.

City Tech CounselorPaul Schwartz says

some veterans are “anxiousover how the generalschool population will

receive them.”

Thousands of Veterans Become Students Again, Challenging the Colleges to Find Ways of Helping Them

duty and four years inactive duty—mean-ing he can still be called and sent to Iraq orAfghanistan. He believes he very likelywill be.

“The odds are pretty good that I will gobecause they don’t have enough troops togo,” said Campbell, who was born in Nigeria.

He said he watches the news about Iraqevery night with trepidation and was espe-cially frightened upon learning that morethan a hundred U.S. servicemen were killedin October alone. What’s worse are theemails he gets from fellow Marines, whogive him the inside scoop on what it is likeover there.

He said he has refused an invitation tore-enlist, turning down the approximately$30,000 he would get for doing so.

Recruiting at or near campuses, which inthe past has caused tensions with anti-waractivists, has been occurring quietly androutinely, campus administrators say. AtBorough of Manhattan Community in low-er Manhattan, for example, recruiters fromthe services are seen regularly on the side-walks talking with students and encouragingthem to consider signing up.

Figures for the fall of 2006 show thereare 31 reservists, 156 regular veterans andeight disabled vets at BMCC. CUNY offi-cials say there are about 1,600 students reg-istered as veterans across the University, butthe officials say they believe there are actu-ally about 3,000 veterans in total.

Some of the colleges are in the processof studying the impact of having significantnumbers of veterans, some of them warveterans, on their campuses.

“As greater numbers of returning veter-ans are being seen at the Office of theRegistrar and the Counseling Departmentat Queensborough Community College, itbecame clear that a forum for the veteranson campus would be very beneficial,” says amemo from the college’s counseling office.

The memo, intended to be the basis forfurther research into the needs of student-veterans, notes that a veterans club wasformed at Queensborough in the springand that the veterans “lack informationabout where to go for vocational rehabilita-tion and other support services.” The vetsare also seeking “emotional support,” andsome veterans have “had to drop theirclasses because of various stressors andredeployment,” says the memo, sent to

CUNY Matters byAndrea Cohen, acounselor at the col-lege’s counselingcenter.

Abdul Montaser, a24-year-old studentat Kingsborough,wants to be clearthat not all veteransare emotional basketcases. Their experi-ences differed great-ly, depending onbranch of service,where they weredeployed—and whenthey were deployed.

Montaser, wholives in downtownBrooklyn, joined theMarine reserves afterhis graduation fromhigh school because

he didn’t want “to go the college route” atthat time. He figured boot camp would betough but then the rest would be easy.

But after September 11, he was called toactive duty to become part of a domesticsecurity detail, serving from 2002 to 2003.During his active stint, he was called toserve in Iraq and spent sixmonths.

His family is from Yemen, soas an Arabic-speaker Montasermainly served as a translator.The situation in Iraq was notnearly as bad then, in 2003, asit’s been over the past year, withincreasing strife between theSunnis and the Shia, he said.

“It was tough, the weatherwas so hot and all theequipment you had to wear…but it wasn’t that bad,”Montaser who is studying radiobroadcasting at Kingsbor-oughand does street promotion for50 Cent’s recordlabel G-UnitRecords.

“I don’t wantto glorify what Idid there,”Montaser said,“because what thesoldiers are goingthrough now is alot more danger-ous than anythingI did. The soldiersserving now havea real tough time.”

Hoping to dowhat it can toease their transi-tion, New YorkCity College ofTechnology haslaunched a new“Project W.I.N.”program. The col-lege says it wantsto “promote the academic suc-cess of the increasing number ofveterans enrolling at thecollege.”

In comments that recall thetensions of the Vietnam era,Paul Schwartz, a counselor with

City Tech’s Counseling Services Center,said that veterans today come equippedwith a plethora of skills; but “concerns overgrowing anti-war sentiment resulting fromthe U.S. military involvement in Iraq havemade some veteran students anxious overhow the general school population willreceive them.”

City Tech says thatProject W.I.N. isdesigned, in part, toencourage student-veterans “to allay theirconcerns about openlyidentifying themselvesas veterans.”

Schwartz concludesby saying, “Above allelse, we want them toknow that they’ll bewelcomed at CityTech.”

In the end, it is per-haps precisely that—anurturing, welcomingattitude—that willmake all the difference for veterans, as forother students with special needs. In thisregard, the website of CUNY’s VeteransAffairs website (www.cuny.edu/veterans)includes, as personal testimony, a statement

from recent Hunter graduate John Byrnes.“In October of 2003, just a few credits

shy of a January graduation, I was mobi-lized for duty in Iraq. It was fifteen monthsbefore I was able to return to college,”Byrnes writes.

“The interruptions of schooling causedby my deploymentswere frustrating, andat times it seemed likeno one at schoolunderstood the situa-tion. The systemwasn’t prepared formilitary students.

“Through it all, inspite of thefrustrations, HunterCollege administratorsworked withme…When I graduat-ed in June of 2005,Hunter CollegePresident JenniferRaab made a point oftelling my story to

everyone in attendance.”Byrnes concludes saying, “As an alumnus

and a veteran, I’m now working with theUniversity to help make CUNY an evenfriendlier place for veterans.”


Kingsborough Community College student Jesse Campbell, whoserved four years as an active-duty Marine, but believes he may soonbe re-activated and sent to Iraq.

“It was one hell ofan experience…

But compared to otherunits, we were lucky.We only lost one guy.

We had twenty injured.”– Ariel Luna, a

Brooklyn College seniorwho served recently as an

army sergeant in Iraq.

llenging the Colleges to Find Ways of Helping Them

The City University of New York has launched several major initiatives aimed at recruiting vet-erans and assisting them in overcoming educational, financial and other obstacles they face

while pursuing a college education.• All colleges have appointed veterans affairs coordinators to disseminate information to veterans.• A new website, www.cuny.edu/veterans, with features and information on admissions, finances,and services available to vets, is in operation. On the website, veterans are able to post commentsabout matters of concern to their community. The CUNY site is also linked to the Mayor’s Officeof Veterans Affairs website at www.nyc.gov.• Special “one-stop” centers, where veterans receive counseling on benefits, and special help inadapting to their lives as students, have opened or are being planned at the campuses.• CUNY in November participated in a New York Times-sponsored “Salute to Heroes” RecruitmentDay, attended by several thousand veterans and active servicemen and servicewoman. Universityrepresentatives counseled the attendees on opportunities at the colleges and on career paths.

In a notable symbolic gesture, theUniversity had a float in this November’sNew York City Veterans Day parade.Chancellor Matthew Goldstein said theUniversity has an obligation to helpveterans as they re-enter civilian life andbegin pondering career options.

“Veterans Day should be observed allyear round. We must ensure that veteranscan re-enter civilian life and find successthrough education,” said ChancellorMatthew Goldstein, speaking of theUniversity’s new initiatives.

“Thousands of young men and womenare returning to metropolitan New Yorkfrom military service, and we believe it isour duty to help them find a path to thesuccess,” the Chancellor added.

Robert Ptachik, the University Dean forthe Executive Office and Enrollment, hasbeen helping to oversee the expandedefforts for veterans. He’s especially fit to dothe job because he’s a veteran who waswounded in the Vietnam War.

Working with him is Christopher Rosa,the University’s coordinator of services to veterans and students with disabilities.

Ptachik said, “For me, this is more than just a professional undertaking. It is emotional. What Iwould like to see is that men and women who come back to the campus are welcomed and havesupport in a way that wasn’t true for people of my generation.”

He added, “CUNY is committed to providing returning veterans with a place where they cannot only meet their educational and career goals, but where they can be confident that their ser-vice to our nation is valued and celebrated.”

Above is an ad created to encourage veterans to come to CUNY’s col-leges. In uniform on the Brooklyn College campus in late Septemberwere (left, wearing camouflage) former Army Sgt. Ariel J. Luna andformer Marine Cpl. David H. Faed (right, in Marine dress uniform).Both are now Brooklyn College students.

RReettuurrnniinngg VVeetteerraannssCChhoooossee CCUUNNYY

TThhee CCiittyy UUnniivveerrssiittyy ooff NNeeww YYoorrkk• Affordable tuition, available financial aid• 21 colleges located throughout New York City• Returning veterans counseling• Over 1400 academic programs• Online Baccalaureate Degree• GED and ESL programs• World-renowned faculty

For moreinformation, call1-800-CUNY-YESor visitwww.cuny.edu/veterans

University-wide Push to Recruit and Assist Veterans


STUDENTHONORS

During her White House Fellowshipyear, the Sophie Davis alumna met andchatted with some of the country’s mostpowerful officials—including PresidentBush, CEO’s of corporations, and U.S. mili-tary commanders. She also met fellow CityCollege alum Powell.

But Katrina, which took hundreds oflives and crushed many more spirits, is theevent that will always stand out with spe-cial prominence in her memory.

“I would say, in a sense, that theFellowship year was largely defined byHurricane Katrina,” said Zephyrin, who vis-ited the area twice and worked on variousissues related to emergency preparedness.

The goal of the White House Fellow-ship program is to show brilliant and ambi-tious young professionals like Zephyrin justhow public policy is made at the highestlevels. In Zephyrin’s case, she applied to theprogram hoping to better understand theintersection between medicine and busi-ness, and medicine and public policy.

Zephyrin says her life’s ambition is tohelp deliver quality health care to low-income, underrepresented communities.“How do you improve the delivery of careto the broadest number of people?” sheasked rhetorically.

Her humanistic view is traceable toSophie Davis, where she says DeanStanford Roman also summarizes his mis-sion with a question: “How do you create a

cadre of youngpeople who wantto give back to theunderserved peo-ple of New YorkState?”

Among thoseresponding to thechallenge posed bythat query wasthen faculty mem-ber Dr. JackGeiger, who men-tored Zephyrin.Geiger, now retiredand a professoremeritus, was thefounding chairper-son of the School’sDepartment ofCommunityHealth andMedicine.

Dr. Laurie Zephyrin is nowimmersed in her demand-ing work at the Columbia

University Medical Center, whereshe’s an Assistant Professor inObstetrics and Gynecology, and atthe Allen Pavilion, where shetreats upper-Manhattan patients,large numbers of them onMedicaid.

But Zephyrin, a 1997 graduateof City College’s Sophie DavisSchool of Biomedical Education, isstill heady from her experiences atthe center of power inWashington, where she spent ayear in the country’s most presti-gious program for leadership andpublic service.

A thousand or so apply everyyear for the White HouseFellowship, and about a dozen areselected. Among the approxi-mately 600 alumni over the 42-year history of the program are atleast two other CUNY graduates.

The most famous of all Fellows is ColinPowell, who, like Zephyrin, is an alumnusof City College (Class of 1958). He was aFellow between 1972 and 1973 and, ofcourse, went on to become a U.S. Secretaryof State.

Another is Eric Hothan, who earned hismaster’s degree from Hunter in 1990 andwas in the 2002-2003 group of Fellows.Hothan, on leave as a New York CityPolice Department captain during hisFellowship, retired from the NYPD lastyear. He was unavailable for comment.

As for Zephyrin, she started her stint asa White House Fellow on Sept. 1, 2005, asHurricane Katrina was leaving death,destruction, and despair throughout theGulf region.

Given her background as a physicianand her assignment with the Departmentof Veterans Affairs, Zephyrin found herselfdispatched to the area right away.

“My first couple of days on the job Itraveled with the Secretary (VeteransAffairs Secretary Jim Nicholson) to theGulf Coast to see first-hand the impact ofHurricane Katrina,” Zephyrin said.

The Department of Veterans Affairs hadthe task of making sure veterans werecared for, and that the Department’s medi-cal facilities were made available—as muchas possible, given the destruction—to allthose in need.

Sophie Davis isa jewel in thecountry’s store-house of medicaleducation.Students pursuepre-med studiesfor five years, andthen they attend(for two years)one of a halfdozen participat-ing medicalschools. The medi-cal schoolsinclude: AlbanyMedical College,DartmouthMedical School,New York MedicalCollege, New YorkUniversity Schoolof Medicine, TheState University ofNew York (SUNY)

Health Science Center at Brooklyn, andSUNY at Stony Brook School of Medicine.

Zephyrin graduated from NYU in 1999.During Zephyrin’s year in Washington,

she met scores of leaders from the nationaland world scene. “We met with about threeto four global leaders a week… Essentiallythe twelve of us would get to sit with themin an intimate setting,” she recalled.

Among those who shared time with theFellows was President Bush. “He met withus in the Roosevelt Room for two hours,maybe a little bit more,” Zephyrin said ofthe January session at the White House,where the president answered their ques-tions and spoke broadly of the responsibili-ties facing public leaders.

The White House Fellowship wasdesigned for promising American men andwomen in a range of professions. Diverse intheir backgrounds and ethnicities, they doshare one notable trait: They are all young.

It must be said of Zephyrin that she isaccustomed to youthful success. At the ageof 15, when she was a student at BrooklynTechnical High School, she knew she want-ed to be a physician. Later she was accept-ed into the Sophie Davis program, wherestudents—because of the five-year, two-year arrangement—emerge as very youngphysicians. Zephyrin received her medicaldegree at the age of 24.

Besides two trips to the Gulf Coast,Zephyrin traveled during her fellowship year“to Alaska to get a sense of environmentalpolicy,” and also to Panama, Chile, Colombia,Argentina and Brazil “to get a sense of U.S.foreign policy” in Latin America.

Among the others in Zephyrin’sFellowship class were a Rhodes Scholar, aC.E.O., an investment banker, two lawyersand several with military backgrounds.

Before receiving the Fellowship,Zephyrin was a Robert Wood JohnsonScholar at Johns Hopkins University inBaltimore, where she did clinical work andresearch on issues such as women withHIV and cervical cancer.

In terms of her development as a personand a professional, the doctor said she owesher greatest debt to her parents, Antonioand Carmela Zephyrin. The Zephyrins emi-grated here from Haiti in the 1960s, andthey still live in Queens Village, where theyraised their children.

“They really focused on their family. Theysacrificed everything for us,” Zephyrin said.

Award for Student Exposé

The International Press Association ofNew York honored Brooklyn College

journalism student Claudio Cabrerawith a third place award for a story hedid while working last winter as anintern for the Amsterdam News.

The story, titled “Punishing PhoneCall Tax for Families of Incarcerated, ”first appeared in the Amsterdam Newson February 8, 2006. It was reprintedthe next day in edition 206 of VoicesThat Must Be Heard, the online newslet-ter of IPA-New York.

In the story Cabrera exposed howNew York State levies a heavy tax oninmates of the state’s Department ofCorrection prisons and their loved onesby requiring that convicts must call theirfamilies collect, using a prison system-operated phone system that marks upcalls by as much as 630 percent.

Cabrera received his award at aceremony held October 27, 2006.

New Board Member

The CUNY Boardof Trustees has a

new ex-officio mem-ber, Brooklyn Collegegraduate studentRobert Ramos, Jr.,who is replacingCarlos Sierra as thestudent representa-tive and as Chairperson of theUniversity Student Senate.

Having grown up in the Brownsvillesection of Brooklyn—he now lives inFlatbush, just two blocks from his col-lege—Ramos knows the problems ofpre-college public education in NewYork City.

“I would say one of the main prob-lems is inequitable funding, how someschools get more money than otherschools,” said Ramos, who’s going for amaster of science degree in childhoodmathematics.

Throughout CUNY, Ramos said, he’dlike to see more full-time faculty mem-bers and will work toward that goal.

The new board member assumed hisex-officio post in late October.

Kudos for Sleep Study

Matthew A. Tucker, now completinga Ph.D. program in psychology, led

a team of researchers that published anarticle about sleep in a prestigious jour-nal, Neurobiology of Learning andMemory.

The article was picked up and referredto in a number of other publications inNorth America and Europe this fall.

Tucker and the others do theirresearch at The Laboratory of CognitiveNeuroscience and Sleep, affiliated withthe CUNY Graduate Center and locatedat City College, Tucker said.

The researchers found that “slowwave” sleep—even in small chunks oftime and even without the so-calledREM (or rapid eye movement) activity—helps people to perform better onmemory tests.

“What we found was that if subjectsget this 45 minutes of sleep, theyimprove on memory tasks,” Tucker said.

Tucker is slated to defend his disserta-tion in mid-December.

Robert Ramos, Jr.

Sophie Davis Grad Completes White House Fellowship

Dr. Laurie Zephyrin, at the Allen Pavilion in upper Manhattan, where she treatspatients. A graduate of CCNY’s Sophie Davis School of Biomedical Education, sherecently finished a year as a White House Fellow.

Colin Powell Recalls Year asWhite House Fellow (1972-73)

“When the Fellows discussed thepower of the executive branch, it

was with President Nixon. When we stud-ied the legislative branch, it was the U.S.senators. When the subject was social pro-grams, we talked to the Secretary ofHealth, Education and Welfare… The aimof the program was to let us inside theengine room to see the cogs and gears ofgovernment grinding away and also to takeus up high for the panoramic view. In all the schools of politicalscience, in all the courses in public administration throughout thecountry, there could be nothing comparable to this education.

…The people I had met during that year were going to shapemy future in ways unimaginable to me then…”

– (excerpted from My American Journey, by Colin Powell, withJoseph E. Persico, Random House, 1995.)

BOOKTALK

chain of labor camps called OrganizationSchmelt. At its height there were 177Schmelt factories, most of them devoted tomajor construction projects and productionof war materiel. One Oskar Schindler ran anumber of them. Ordered into the systemby Merin, Sala worked at several.

But the heart of Sala’s Gift is the revela-tion, on almost every page, of Sala’s sheer

will to endure amidhorrific brutality.Allowed one briefvisit home from acamp, she tried to lifther family’s spirits:“Yes, I will be back!I’m here now, aren’tI? I was away—but Icame back. Be strong,I will return!” But herfather saw the future.Sala would never for-get his reply. “Hewent on, in a directand solemn way…‘Mydear child, I will neversee you again.’” JosefGarncarz was right.An appendix in Sala’sGift lists about 40immediate andextended familymembers who died inthe exterminationcamps, including Josefand his wife Chana.

Sala’s early diarypassages now and

then capture the weight of separation andall the ambient brutality. Early on, at herfirst camp, she records, “The world is moan-ing, life is terrible, and there is much tolament.…The world is complaining, andthere is a void around us.” But the morecommon note is one of determined opti-mism. Sala boasts, justly, in one letter, “I amone stubborn girl.” That grit was especiallyneeded as the Nazis were being pushedback on the eastern and western fronts in1944 and as labor camps were closed, theirworkers put on trains or death marches tothe gas chambers.

By Gary Schmidgall

Back in 1991, a week before triple-bypass surgery was scheduled for her,67-year-old Sala Garncarz Kirschner

decided to give up her decades-oldcigarette habit. Before she entered the hos-pital, Sala also decided to give up herdecades-old secrecy.She produced a redcardboard box andgave it to her daugh-ter for safe-keeping,saying simply, “Youshould have this.”

That daughter,Ann, thought at firstthe box might containjewelry, but insteadout poured more than350 items—letters,government and war-related documents,diary entries, andphotographs—recre-ating the heroic andharrowing story ofSala’s odysseythrough seven Nazilabor camps inGermany, Poland, andCzechoslovakiabetween 1940 and1945, in her late teensand early 20’s.

Ann Kirschner,newly appointedDean of the CUNY Honors College, writesthat the cardboard box changed her life,setting her off on a journey of discovery toput these materials, written in Polish,Yiddish, but mostly German, into familialand historical context. After solving manypuzzles evoked by the trove and numeroussubsequent interviews with Sala and herone surviving sister, Raizel, as well as manyHolocaust survivors, Kirschner has nowpublished Sala’s Gift: My Mother’sHolocaust Story (Free Press).

That the memorabilia—most important-ly the letters Sala received from family andfriends—survived at all was a miracle.Perhaps the only good thing about laborcamps was that mail and care packageswere allowed. At great risk of punishmentby her S.S. guards, Sala began to save andhide her letters. The precious hoard grewand, amazingly, she succeeded in keeping iton her person when shunted from onecamp to the next. Months after the ordealwas over, Sala wrote triumphantly to theonly other of 11 Garncarz siblings alive atwar’s end, Raizel and Blima (who died in1953), “I have the pictures of our dearfather and dear mother, together with allthe mail I received from home…I watchedit and guarded it like the eyes in my head,since it was my greatest treasure.”

Kirschner’s study vividly recreates life inthe Jewish community of the medium-sizePolish city of Sosnowiec in Upper Silesia asthe Nazis began their genocidal work (only4,000 of the city’s 28,000 Jews survived),working through Jewish collaborators inthe Jewish Council of Elders. The villain inSosnowiec was one Moses Merin, whofinally lost his usefulness, was arrested, andgassed himself at Oswiecim, renamed bythe Germans Auschwitz.

A notable virtuoso of evil in the book isAlbrecht Schmelt, the creator of a vast


Science of First Impressions

Typecasting is an ambi-tious book that chroni-

cles the emergence of the“science of first impression,”revealing how the work ofits creators—early socialscientists—continues toshape how we see the world.

Written by spouses Stuart Ewen andElizabeth Ewen—he of the CUNYGraduate Center and the Film and MediaStudies Department at Hunter College,and she a professor of American Studiesat SUNY Old Westbury—Typecasting waspublished by Seven Stories Press.

The authors present a vivid portrait ofstereotyping forged by colonialism, massmedia and the global economy.

Interviews with Woody Allen

Over his long filmmak-ing career, Woody

Allen, who turns 71 inDecember, has gained areputation as a reluctant,reticent interviewee.Happily, there is much tobelie this close-to-the-vestreputation in Woody Allen Interviews(University Press of Mississippi).

The Q and A’s were collected andedited by Robert Kapsis, Queens Collegesociologist, and Kathie Coblentz of theNew York Public Library.

Among the many priceless Woodymoments in the volume is the bogglingnews, in Frank Rich’s lively 1979 inter-view for Time magazine, that the originaltitle for Annie Hall was Anhedonia, thepsycholanalytic term meaning “incapableof experiencing pleasure.”

Impresario Tells All

Max Maretzek is wellknown among

aficionados of New YorkCity’s musical life for histwo colorful memoirs thatwere published in 1855 and 1890.

Now Ruth Henderson, music librarianat City College, has published FurtherRevelations of an Opera Manager in 19thCentury America (Harmonie Park Press),an informatively introduced and fullyannotated third installment of Maretzek’smemoirs that was left in manuscript athis death in 1897. (It came to light out ofa Staten Island attic in 1981.)

Among the highlights of the volumeare Maretzek’s description of takingunder his wing Clara Louise Kellogg, thefirst American singer to enjoy a stellarEuropean career.

Global Perspectives

Call it a study of intel-lectual and cultural

diversity.Lead, Follow, or Move

Out of the Way: GlobalPerspectives in Literature includes worksby well-known writers like JamesBaldwin, Ralph Waldo Emerson, ToniMorrison and Elie Wiesel, who sharespace with lesser-known artists.

The authors—City Tech Englishprofessors Monique Ferrell and JulianWilliams—say they want to provide asafe space for their students to learn,express and develop a clearer picture ofwho they wish to become. Their newbook was published by Kendall/HuntPublishing Company.

Letters, Silent 50 Years, Speak of the Holocaust

To left,portrait of Salaas age 12.

Below, firstpage of Sala’sdiary, entry ofOctober 28,1940.

Book cover of Sala’s Gift, the story of AnnKirschner's mother’s experiences in Nazilabor camps.

Perhaps the most fascinating characterin Sala’s story (worthy of Hollywood treat-ment) is a jaunty, charismatic Polish Jewnamed Ala Gertner. She happened to bepresent when Sala was put on the train toher first labor camp. An older woman, shetook the frightened teenager under herwing and made Sala her protégé from herposition of some influence with the Nazis(she worked for a while in the offices ofMoses Merin). Some of the most poignantsaved letters are from Ala written after thetwo were sent to different factories.

Kirschner’s most riveting pages recountAla’s heroic end. By mid-1943, her rela-tively comfortable life in the offices oflabor camps ended, and she was transport-ed to a factory making explosive devicesadjacent to the Auschwitz crematoria. Alajoined three other women in the camp’sunderground resistance who were assignedto the gunpowder room. Their conspiracywas to save out tiny amounts of powder,make a bomb of their own, and then blowup a crematorium. On October 7, 1944,their plot succeeded.

This so-called Auschwitz Uprisingcaused a huge furor and intense investiga-tion, described in detail by Kirschner. Theconspirators were caught and executed onJanuary 5, 1945. The last roll call atAuschwitz was, heartbreakingly, a mere 12days later. A monument to the four is inthe garden of the Holocaust memorial YadVashem in Jerusalem.

By June of 1946, Sala was settled in anEast Harlem apartment as the bride ofSidney Kirschner, an American soldier. “Shehid the box of letters,” Kirschner writes.“She said nothing about them or about herlife during the war for nearly fifty years.”

A few years after Sala’s letters saw thelight, Ann, her parents, and her brothersJoseph and David paid their only visit backto Sosnowiec. Returning to the still-stand-ing one-room Garncarz apartment onKollataja Street, Sala summed up with elo-quent simplicity into a tape recorder: “Thisis the worst experience of my life. ... All Isee is the family I left here, and I havecome back to a terrible, terrible dirty littleroom that is hardly fit for anyone to live in.And yet here I grew up and loved every-thing in it. I don’t see ‘things.’ I just see mypeople. I see them in every corner.”

Happily, Kirschner reports that her par-ents are alive and well, living upstate inMonsey, New York. “But they do winter inFlorida.” Sala’s letters now reside in theDorot Jewish Division at the N.Y.P.L andcan be found online at www.nypl.org andwww.letterstosala.org.


About a year ago, JamesJackson, Jr. noticed that hissister, LaShawna, always

seemed to be logged onto Facebook,the popular social networkingWebsite, talking with friends fromhigh school or college classmates atTemple University.

“I wanted to have the same kind ofconnection,” said Jackson, a senior atNew York City College of Technology.So he registered with Facebook, putup a personal profile, and beganassembling his “friends” list.

Pretty soon, he was spending a lotof time on Facebook—a lot. “Onceyou get in it, it gets addictive,” saidthe Brooklyn resident. “It’s the new‘safe drug,’” he joked. Later, he alsojoined MySpace, the wildly popularnetworking site among both highschool and college students. He nowhas close to 200 friends on Facebook,about 80 from CUNY, and about 500friends on MySpace.

While he’s no longer constantlylogged onto the sites (“I’ve digressedto checking once a day”), he stillenjoys browsing through his friendslists, posting comments or messages.“I’ll holler at somebody—‘Hey, think-ing about you, just wondering howyou were doing.’”

Jackson is among millions of col-lege students nationwide who nowlog on every day to social sites likeFacebook, MySpace, Friendster andXanga. MySpace, which waslaunched in 2003 and is now ownedby media magnate Rupert Murdoch’sNews Corp., accounts for more thana lion’s share of social networkingtraffic, with tens of millions of users.Facebook, founded in 2004 by agroup of Harvard University students,has fewer users, but initially wasknown for serving exclusively collegestudents, until it recently decided toexpand membership to everyone.

While there is no official count ofhow many CUNY students are mem-bers of such sites—users are notrequired to put down a college affilia-tion—it’s clear that they are now aubiquitous part of campus life.

Everyone is Doing It“The buzz is that if you’re in college,

you have a page,” said Ken Bach, director ofpublic relations at College of Staten Island.At CSI, which has about 12,000 students,more than 4,800 people are registered onMySpace, said Bach, but “from the studentsthat I’ve spoken to, they’ve said theywouldn’t be surprised if every student isthere,” but for some reason or other did notput down their affiliation.

Most students who use these networksput up profiles that include an array of per-sonal information, from photo albums tofavorite movies, books, quotes and socialactivities. Others join networking groupsthat reflect particular interests oraffiliations. On MySpace, for example,there are CUNY groups for students atBaruch College, Hunter College and JohnJay College of Criminal Justice, as well as a

separate group, “Queer CUNY,” wheregay and lesbian students “can meeteach other, discuss important topics,

and share event information” across theuniversity’s 19 campuses.

“It’s fulfilling a demand that students arelooking for, whether it’s singular interests orpeer levels,” said Brian Cohen, CUNY’sChief Information Officer. “This gives peo-ple another tool to create their ownforums.”

Jackson points out that social network-ing sites can be especially useful in makingfriends at commuter schools. When Jacksonis on campus, “it can be hard for people tocome up to you and start a conversation,”he says. “But if they see you on Facebookfirst, it makes it easier to break the ice.”

Networking sites have grown so popularthat faculty and administrators at manyuniversities, including CUNY, are exploringways to use such sites to reach out tostudents.

“I’m a firm believer in communicatingwith students in ways that are compatiblewith how they are living their lives and,these days, their lives are often virtual,”says Alexandra Logue, Special Advisor tothe Chancellor of the City University of

New York.Logue, who has her own pages on

MySpace and Facebook, notes that manystudents now do all their e-mail throughthese sites, rather than using traditionale-mail.

By most accounts, the most prominentexample of institutional use of networkingsites at CUNY has been undertaken byBeth Evans, an electronic services specialistand associate professor at Brooklyn CollegeLibrary. After being introduced to MySpacea year ago by her then-15-year-old daugh-ter, Nell, Evans decided to launch aBrooklyn College Library MySpace profilelast March, with the help of two interns,Frances Keiser and Jonathan Cope. From apool of more than 5,000 students whoidentified themselves as affiliated withBrooklyn College, Evans and her internssigned up 1,880 friends of BrooklynCollege Library—including several otherlibraries—who would receive invitations toevents, announcements, unsolicited libraryinstruction, and answers to any questionsthey had about the library. (They later set

Professor Elected toInstitute of Medicine

Dr. Marthe R. Gold, Chair of Com-munity Health and Social Medicine at

The Sophie Davis School of BiomedicalEducation, has been elected to the Instituteof Medicine.

“(Institute) members are elected througha highly selective process that recognizespeople who have made major contributionsto the advancement of the medical sciences,health care and public health,” said InstitutePresident Harvey V. Fineberg.

“Election is considered one of the high-est honors in the fields of medicine andhealth.”

The appointment of Gold, a medicaldoctor who—in addition to being a depart-ment chair—is also Arthur C. LoganProfessor at Sophie Davis, was hailed as atremendous honor for the School by itsdean, Dr. Stanford Roman.

“As a clinician, teacher and policymaker,Marthe Gold has been a tireless championof the value of preventive care in improv-ing the quality and cost effectiveness ofcare provided to members of economicallydisadvantaged groups,” Roman said.

“The Sophie Davis faculty joins me insaluting this tremendous honor.”

Part of The City College of New York,Sophie Davis’s goal is to train physicianswho will provide health care tounderserved communities in New York.

The Institute of Medicine, established bythe National Academy of Science in 1970,announced its 65 new members this fall,brining its total active membership to1,501. The Institute is a nationally recog-nized resource for independent, scientificanalysis and for making recommendationson issues related to human health.

Gold, who joined the Sophie Davis fac-ulty in 1997, previously spent six years as asenior policy advisor in the U.S. Depart-ment of Health and Human Services, work-ing on economic and financing issues fordisease prevention and health promotion.She participated in the Clinton 1993 TaskForce for Health Care Reform. Also, shedirected the work of the Panel on Cost-Effectiveness in Health and Medicine, anon-federal expert group whose finalreport, issued by the Department of Healthand Human Services in 1996, remains aninfluential guide to cost-effectivenessmethodology for academic and policy uses.

Gold received her M.D. with honorsfrom the Tufts University School of

Medicine, and completedher training in Family

Practice at theUniversity ofRochester,where sheserved on thefaculty from1983 to 1990.She received herpublic healthtraining atColumbiaUniversity School

of Public Health.

Dr. MartheGold

James Jackson, Jr.,a City Tech student,has been active withsocial networkingwebsites, MySpaceand Facebook,which are all therage among collegestudents in thecountry—andbeyond.

Online Social Networks Like MySpace and

employer goes there and sees it,” says Bachof the College of Staten Island.

“You have to ask yourself, ‘Would I wanta potential employer to see this picture ofme drinking and playing beer pong?’”Others worry about the dark side of socialnetworking sites, particularly issues dealingwith the invasion of members’ privacy andthe potential dangers of online sexualpredators. In response to such concerns,networking sites have tightened securitycontrols: Members can mark their profiles“private,” allowing access only to their listof friends, and those who want to join net-working groups often must be approved bythe group moderator before being able toview profiles of group members.

“You’re going to find a few bad apples inevery forum,” says Dossous. “When you’reon your own, you need to be your ownmoderator.”

Such concerns notwithstanding, theimmense success of MySpace has prompted

some CUNY offices toconsider new approachesto reaching out tostudents and alumni.Later this year, forinstance, the College ofStaten Island plans tolaunch a networkingspace using iModules, anin-house social networkfor students and alumni.The site, which would belinked to the Staten Islandhome page, would allowalumni and students toupload pictures, look peo-ple up by class, year andmajor, send instant mes-sages and have virtualevents.

“One of its core goalsis to energize alumni and

students about different events and differ-ent networking opportunities,” says Bach.The sites will help job-seeking students and


up a Facebook profile, too.)“Initially, we saw ourselves as an

announcement tool, another way to bringpeople information, instruction or just letpeople know about some event,” Evanssays. At the same time, she adds, “we madeit an unwritten policy to write back toeveryone who commented to us.”

Keiser, a senior at Brooklyn Collegemajoring in English, acknowledges that shewas “very skeptical” about the MySpaceproject when it began. “I was surprised byhow many students wanted to befriend thelibrary,” she says. While there were excep-tions, Keiser says, students generallyexpressed “surprise and delight in the factthat their school library was up onMySpace.”

‘Accessible and Friendly’What makes MySpace different from

typical library sites, Keiser adds, is thatusers have so many tools to communicateand gather informationabout topics that inter-est them. “MySpace isvery accessible andfriendly,” she says. “Theinformation is individ-ualized—and it’s fun.”

Keiser’s internCope, who was amember of Friendsteras an undergraduate atAntioch College—“before MySpacebecame ubiquitous”—says that such sites areso attractive becausethey can be easilymanipulated by theusers. “It’s possible thatother technologiescould usurp MySpace,but one of the thingsthat’s made it so successful is that itallows people to change their profiles.”While most users agree that socializingwith “friends” is the main attraction ofonline networks, a growing number ofthem also say they’re exploring ways touse their profiles for business or careeradvancement.

Nichole Dossous, for example, has twopages on MySpace, “one for strictly social-izing, the other for professional purposes.”Dossous, a Mercy College graduate whohas taken courses in journalism and theInternet at Queens College, now has a siteshe uses to show her media work, includ-ing “Subway Confessions,” a series of shortvideo interviews she’s completed, as wellas her blog and online radio show.

“It keeps me busy,” says Dossous, a part-time office assistant at an Internet compa-ny in Queens. “Plus, I have a network of amillions of people willing to look.”

Can Hurt as Well as HelpIndeed, college officials agree that many

people—including employers—do look atprofiles on MySpace and Facebook. Andthey say that that fact may be cause forconcern.

“Our career and scholarships center istrying to educate students that, yes, this isa fun space, a great space for students tomeet…but information that may be fun toput up for your friends to see may turnout to be not so great, if a potential

alumni to make contactwith alumni entrepreneurs.

Similarly, at MedgarEvers College, the AlumniRelations Office is develop-ing a MySpace Website(www.myspace.com/medgaralum) as a way toreach out to youngeralumni, says ChristopherHundley, director of com-munications and Webservices at Medgar Evers.

“Most of the college’smarketing efforts aretargeted to older demo-graphics, so we wantedto mix it up a bit,”Hundley says.

Most observersbelieve that theseonline social networks,perhaps taking differ-ent forms, are hereto stay.

“Students thesedays do interactdifferently than didprevious genera-tions, using thesesites and usingother electronicmeans,” saysLogue, the specialadvisor to theChancellor.“There’s onlygoing to be moreof that in thefuture, so wemust learn tocommunicatewith them inthese ways—or their commu-nities willsimply existwithout us.”

The CUNY OnlineNetwork in JapanIn America, practically every college student knows about Facebook. In Japan,

they know about Mixi. And thanks to Mixi, they also know about CUNY.Like Facebook and MySpace, Mixi is a social networking site popular among

Japanese students, where they can meet others with common interests, createprofiles, exchange messages, comment on each other’s diaries and join online communities.

Among thousands of Mixi communities is one for students interested in CUNY (there are also separate pages for different CUNYcolleges). Launched last year by a former CUNY student, the site was created to help friends and prospective students interested inattending CUNY—including many students already in the U.S. who are considering a transfer to another college in New York City.

“A lot of people ask about CUNY but don’t know how to access it,”says Kanae Rachi of the New York Japan Student Association.The biggest problem for Japanese students is, of course, the language barrier. So Mixi’s CUNY page enables members to askquestions and solicit advice from Japanese-speaking students who are already familiar with CUNY.

In a sense, the CUNY page has become an accidental recruitment tool for foreign students. It’s not clear whether other foreign-language social networking sites, such as Vietspace, Hyves (Netherlands), Lunar Storm (Sweden) and Grono.net (Poland) have similarCUNY groups. But coming after enrollment of international students dropped in the aftermath of 9/11, Mixi’s CUNY communityhighlights the potential for students to create an unusual, organic recruitment device.

Unlike the more open U.S.-based sites, Mixi is an invitation-only network – you can only join if you’re invited by a current mem-ber. Membership is free, but you must be at least 18 years old. (The word, “Mixi, ” is a combination of “mix” and “I,” referring to theconcept that the user, I, mixes with others through the network.)

Except for a listing of CUNY colleges, the Mixi page, which has about 450 members, is essentially a blog. Posts by membersinclude questions and answers about transcripts, tuition, and information about events like job fairs.

One recent post, for example, noted: “I have heard about the CUNY Admission’s Office reputation from my friend. I lived in NYCfor a year, and I understand that nothing goes as smoothly as it does here in Japan.”

Another student asked about the job prospects in the city for Japanese CUNY graduates. A student who had recently graduated fromCUNY responded that he had, indeed, gotten a job in New York—but it wasn’t easy.

caption to come

“Students these daysdo interact differently

than did previousgenerations…

[W]e must learn tocommunicate with them in

these ways – or theircommunities will simply

exist without us.” – Alexandra Logue, Special

Advisor to the Chancellorand Interim AssociateUniversity Provost

Howto get there...

To visit the page listing these Brooklyn postings, simply go tohttp://myspace.com; then click the “search” link (the thirdbox on the left-hand side of the page); then (next to the“MySpace” search box), enter the terms “CUNY BrooklynClubs”; then click “Search.” (Of course, you can modify yoursearch by entering different terms.)

Facebook are Transforming the College Experience

FOR

MORE

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twww

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and

click

‘even

ts.’

During the December holidays—or maybe we should say“holy days”—many of us take part in religious or culturalcelebrations that give the season its special significance of

togetherness.The menorah, the Christmas tree and the candles of Kwanzaa are

all symbols of traditions that have retained spiritual meaning even asAmerican society has retained its nominal secularity.

As the variety of our religions has expanded—with Muslims,Buddhists, African ancestral worshipers and Sikhs joining Christiansand Jews in the New York mosaic—so has our awareness of the beau-ty and challenges of this great diversity.

At Hostos Community College on December 18, there will be aYafaa Cultural Arts event (yafaa meaning “beauty” in Hebrew) offer-ing music and storytelling that celebrates Christmas, Hanukkah,Kwanzaa and Three Kings.

Meanwhile, over at LaGuardia Community College, a longer viewis being taken. This December and January, administrators and facultyare beginning what they call a “Difficult Dialogue” that will assess theimplications of having a array of beliefs co-existing in the community.

Robert Kahn, the college’s grants administrator, wrote the“Difficult Dialogues” proposal, receiving $100,000 from the FordFoundation to study religious diversity.

Project Director Rosemary Talmadge will supervise an effort to bringtogether students, faculty and community members in “study circles.”

Queens College was also among the 26 colleges nationwide toreceive a $100,000 Difficult Dialogues grant. At Queens, they willfocus more specifically on the Middle East conflict.

A Time for ‘Difficult Dialogues’

Non-Profit OrgU.S. Postage

PAIDUtica,NY

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Office of University RelationsThe City University of New York535 East 80th St.New York, NY 10021

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