Op-Ed | Never a better time to be part of CUNY

Last fall, Lamis Fawaz was riding the subway when she looked up and saw an eye-catching ad for CUNY. “I thought, ‘I’m going there!’”

This week, Lamis starts as a freshman at York College, where she will major in aviation management, the first step toward her goal of becoming an airline pilot. She is one of about 240,000 students arriving on CUNY campuses for the start of a new academic year that brings new programs to better meet the needs of our students.

The new initiatives include new academic programs in AI and education, a revamped transfer process that is making it easier for students to transfer major credits between CUNY colleges; and much more.

There is a new Master of Science in generative AI at CUNY’s School of Professional Studies and a Bachelor of Science in data science and AI at Lehman College. Medgar Evers College is introducing CUNY’s first fully online education degree, a Bachelor of Arts in childhood education; Baruch College is unveiling its first doctoral program, an Ed.D. in higher education administration.

There is also a university-wide initiative, CUNY AI for Everyone, which will give all students the opportunity to build fluency in the rapidly evolving technology. The initiative includes a free Google course in generative AI fundamentals and a variety of non-credit courses and industry-led workshops, including an interactive five-week series of in-person sessions where students work with professionals from companies including Amazon, EY, JPMorgan Chase and PwC to build AI-driven projects.

And the CUNY Transfer Initiative will enable students to fully and seamlessly transfer credits between CUNY colleges for the first time, creating consistency across the system and the potential to save an average of up to $1,220 in duplicated credits for bachelor’s transfer students.

But college is not all about academics. That’s why we’re encouraging students to take advantage of the about 1,000 clubs and organizations that are available to them. Lamis Fawaz is doing her part: she’s planning to reactivate York’s chapter of Women in Aviation International.

CUNY is also launching Governor Hochul’s free community college initiative, which covers tuition, books and fees for those between 25 and 55 who pursue degrees in high-demand fields.

We are also taking steps to help members of our diverse University community cope with rapidly evolving federal policy surrounding immigration. Funded by the Carroll and Milton Petrie Foundation, The CUNY Immigration Assistance Project (CIAP) is a new rapid response legal resource that provides emergency consultations with attorneys for CUNY students and employees impacted by changing immigration policies.

There’s never been a better time to be part of CUNY.

Matos Rodríguez is the chancellor of The City University of New York (CUNY), the largest urban public university system in the United States.