President Martí's Response to the Proposed CUNY Master Plan

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·	President Martí's Response to the Proposed CUNY Master Plan

Response to Proposed CUNY Master Plan
From
President Eduardo J. Martí
To
Executive Vice Chancellor Selma Botman

I am delighted to comment on the Draft of the Master Plan. First, let me congratulate you and your staff on a well-crafted document that demonstrates the progress made by our University since the “CUNY: An Institution Adrift” and that charts the course for the next five years. The transformation of this University is indeed remarkable and reading this document should make anyone proud to be associated with CUNY.

As someone who has been part of the community college movement for 42 years, I am gratified to see that community colleges are prominent in the future development of an integrated CUNY. CUNY community colleges, as the portals of entry into the University to many recently-arrived Americans as well as native-born, must be a welcoming bridge between the secondary and the post-secondary sectors. Without this sector, the University could become exclusive and inaccessible. Access and excellence can only be achieved with a strong community college system that emphasizes advising, counseling, academic support services while maintaining high curricular standards.

This process began in earnest with the restructuring of the admissions process. It could have been difficult without the Community College Investment Plan. Through this plan, the University asked community colleges to take on the responsibility of offering most of the remedial courses while providing us with the necessary resources to maintain standards. But there is more to be done.

The Master Plan calls for a possible new community college. I hope that in the due diligence to be done before a seventh community college is established, we examine the issues affecting the retention and graduation rates at the existing six colleges. The senior colleges are, for the most part, selective in their admission. Whereas advising, counseling, tutoring and other academic support services are important at the senior colleges, it is these services that make the difference between success and failure for students at colleges operating under the policy of Open Admissions. So, the approach to the student, by definition, is different at the community colleges.

CUNY’s community colleges provide the all-important access to higher education that is a fundamental core value for our University. The Open Admissions Policy enables anyone who has minimum qualifications to gain entrance to CUNY through its community colleges. The dream, made possible by a truly integrated University, is dependent on a strong retention and graduation rate from the entry point, whether a community college or a baccalaureate granting unit, to the highest degree achievable by the student. Specifically for community colleges, this means that we must provide our students the academic tools necessary to improve their chances for success. To that end, the Campaign for Student Success should be enhanced to ensure that the Freshman Experience contains an extended orientation; opportunities for cohort-education methodologies; introduction to college experience courses; tutoring; student monitors; milestone and capstone experiences.