Brooklyn College PSC-CUNY

To aid in the PSC’s press for a fair and exhaustive review of Pathways, please share your experience of the new curriculum on this  web form . The union wants to know how your students’ education is affected and how Pathways affects your day-to-day work. Reports collected here may be posted on the website, printed in  Clarion , presented to the CUNY central administration, or cited in public testimony. Selected testimony may also be shared with the media.

The State Senate’s one-house budget resolution is appalling: it sells out public K-12 education in favor of charter schools and private schools; it leaves CUNY woefully underfunded while reducing estate taxes for the wealthiest New Yorkers; it includes a property tax freeze that would primarily benefit the rich; and it says NO to the NYS DREAM Act, ignoring that undocumented students were brought to New York as children. Don’t let the short list of proposed CUNY restorations in the Senate budget resolution make you think it’s a “good budget;” it’s not! And don’t let the news about the Senate’s support of funding of universal pre-K in NYC obscure the true priorities of the Senate Republicans and the Independent Democratic Caucus. The Senate’s budget plan—its starting position in negotiations with the governor and the Assembly—is bad for CUNY, bad for CUNY students and bad for most New Yorkers. Educators across the State are standing up to denounce the Senate’s plan and calli...

1) Our students need us to stand up for educational excellence. Despite the claims of serving students by easing transfer (the benefits of which have been grossly overstated), Pathways undermines educational standards. Eliminating science labs, speech, and  foreign language requirements disadvantages our students. Restricting the ability of individual colleges to experiment and specialize outside the narrow Pathways framework undermines innovation and the development of new best practices. 2) Brooklyn College’s Faculty Council is currently undertaking a broad review of general education and we are in a position to challenge the Pathways framework by demonstrating strong faculty support for a general education program that is rigorous and effectively meets our students’ needs. 3) Whatever the ultimate outcome of the general education process it is essential that the faculty make clear that the process used to implement Pathways was a violation of faculty governance and a...

The following Resolution Passed the Brooklyn College Faculty Senate on Tuesday by a vote of 80-1.  After the vote, the Provost thanked the faculty, saying that he had fought and lost to keep the science labs, and that the administration supports the return to the 4 hour science courses. BROOKLYN COLLEGE OF THE CITY UNIVERSITY OF NEW YORK FACULTY COUNCIL March 11, 2014 Special Resolution on General Education Steering Committee Whereas , according to the Governance Plan of Brooklyn College (Article II), the faculty “shall be responsible for the formulation of policy relating to the admission and retention of students, including health and scholarship standards; student attendance, including leaves of absence; curriculum; awarding of college credit; granting of degrees”; and Whereas , Faculty Council is “the legislative body of the Faculty and shall have all the responsibilities of a faculty”;  and Whereas , Faculty Council, at its meeting of ...

Below is draft language of a resolution to come before the Stated Meeting of the Faculty in April. We will be discussing this draft at our Chapter Meeting on March 18th in 222 Whitehead. Feel free to write comments below or email them to alvgc@yahoo.com. Draft Resolution Brooklyn College Stated Meeting of the Faculty April 2014 Whereas, Faculty Council is currently undertaking a process to develop new general education requirements at Brooklyn College, and Whereas, Brooklyn College’s governance plan states that it is the faculty who determine the college’s curriculum and degree requirements, and Whereas it is the faculty who are best positioned to assess the educational needs of students and determine the best ways of meeting those needs, and Whereas we have no confidence in the CUNY Board of Trustees as currently constituted to make curricular decisions, and Whereas Pathways has significantly undermined the educational standards at Brooklyn College, incl...

Dear CCR Supporter, In response to rampant and widespread human rights violations committed by Israel with impunity, the movement for Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) is growing in the United States.  But as BDS activism for Palestinian human rights grows, so does the threat to a critical and time-honored protest tactic:  the right to engage in boycotts to effect political change , which is protected under the First Amendment. In academia, the right to boycott is under fire. State governments in Illinois, New York, and Maryland have introduced legislation that would deny aid to universities that fund organizations that support boycotts of Israeli academic institutions.  Legislation condemning such boycotts is also pending in Pennsylvania and Florida, and we expect more to emerge.   Take action today!  Your action makes a huge difference—last month, constituent outcry in New York stalled an even harsher version of an anti-boycott bill....