2008 Woodie Awards
Spitzer report aims to improve education
Benjamin Pomerance
Issue date: 2/22/08 Section: News
Originally published: 2/21/08 at 4:12 PM EST
Last update: 2/21/08 at 6:47 PM EST
Plattsburgh State President John Ettling spent more than six months waiting for his Christmas present to arrive.
Now, just two months after receiving it, he's worried about it being taken away.
The highly anticipated gift came from Albany, arriving in the form of the preliminary report from Gov. Eliot Spitzer's newly formed Higher Education Commission, a body formed by executive order in May 2007 to identify ways of improving the quality of higher education in New York.
Major recommendations issued by the commission focused mainly on subjects concerning SUNY and SUNY campuses, proposing solutions to perceived problems ranging from faculty size to transfer accessibility to physical structures in need of repair.
The commission's report containing these recommendations landed on the desks of SUNY and CUNY administrators in mid-December, bringing some early holiday cheer to leaders of these state-funded college campuses.
Among the proposals listed in the preliminary report was a call for the hiring of 2,000 new full-time faculty members in SUNY and CUNY schools over the next five years, implementation of a new program allowing seamless transfer between SUNY and CUNY schools by 2011-12, and a sustained program of state funding for critical physical plant maintenance projects on SUNY and CUNY campuses.
"Any SUNY or CUNY leader who read this document had to be pleased," Ettling said. "I am very happy with what I see when I read the recommendations listed in this report, happy for the future of this college and this higher education system. If the state legislature works with SUNY and CUNY to make these concepts reality, we will see some very positive changes in the near future."
The only question now is how near that future will be.
Spitzer's 2008 executive budget excludes certain commission-recommended items entirely, Ettling said, and dramatically reduces the amount of state support granted to other programs recommended in the preliminary report.
Now, just two months after receiving it, he's worried about it being taken away.
The highly anticipated gift came from Albany, arriving in the form of the preliminary report from Gov. Eliot Spitzer's newly formed Higher Education Commission, a body formed by executive order in May 2007 to identify ways of improving the quality of higher education in New York.
Major recommendations issued by the commission focused mainly on subjects concerning SUNY and SUNY campuses, proposing solutions to perceived problems ranging from faculty size to transfer accessibility to physical structures in need of repair.
The commission's report containing these recommendations landed on the desks of SUNY and CUNY administrators in mid-December, bringing some early holiday cheer to leaders of these state-funded college campuses.
Among the proposals listed in the preliminary report was a call for the hiring of 2,000 new full-time faculty members in SUNY and CUNY schools over the next five years, implementation of a new program allowing seamless transfer between SUNY and CUNY schools by 2011-12, and a sustained program of state funding for critical physical plant maintenance projects on SUNY and CUNY campuses.
"Any SUNY or CUNY leader who read this document had to be pleased," Ettling said. "I am very happy with what I see when I read the recommendations listed in this report, happy for the future of this college and this higher education system. If the state legislature works with SUNY and CUNY to make these concepts reality, we will see some very positive changes in the near future."
The only question now is how near that future will be.
Spitzer's 2008 executive budget excludes certain commission-recommended items entirely, Ettling said, and dramatically reduces the amount of state support granted to other programs recommended in the preliminary report.
Viewing Comments 1 - 1 of 1
John Tyler
posted 2/22/08 @ 6:03 PM EST
So after all the mumbo jumbo, what do we have? More empty promises from politicians who don't deliver. Memo to Governor Spitzer: your plan sounds nice, based on what I read here, but it doesn't mean squat unless there is money allotted for projects that actually does something with the important findings of this committee. (Continued…)
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