Learning Environments LEARNING ENVIRONMENTS
CUNY DOMINICAN STUDIES INSTITUTE - PREEMINENT IN ITS FIELD
COLIN POWELL SCHOOL FOR CIVIC AND GLOBAL LEADERSHIP
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The CUNY Dominican Studies Institute (DSI) is the preeminent research center, archive, and library in the United States for the study and understanding of the people and history of the people of Dominican descent in the United States, the Dominican Republic, and elsewhere. DSI is a CUNY-wide institute, but we are proud that DSI makes its home within the Colin Powell School. In its beginnings, the Institute had two immediate goals: Advance a research agenda and ensure an inclusive dissemination program. Well before the Colin Powell School existed, DSI was pioneering an approach to communityfocused work that cemented ties between the Institute’s research and community leaders who make use of it. Early and on-going research focused on Dominican immigrants; on explaining why they came to the United States and settled in New York City; on the importance of the historical and cultural legacies of Dominicans as a people; and on the need to preserve and transmit this heritage among young Dominicans, particularly those born and raised in the
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United States. While the Institute’s original mission has not changed, its research agenda has. It has been affected by an aggressive demographic change in the United States, from a mere 125,000 people of Dominican decent in 1970, to an enlarged population of close to 2,000,000 in 2019. There was once a popular view that described Dominicans as unsettled people, or as immigrants who had one foot there and the other here, living between two worlds. Research now portrays Dominicans as a settled people, with a half century of history in the U.S. Their children’s children already have children of their own. They now win political offices and hold power. The Institute is engaged in important work focused on how Dominicans are integrating, assimilating, and achieving socioeconomic progress in the United States; and on understanding how a portion of Dominicans have managed to move up the socioeconomic ladder while the majority continue to lag behind. DSI had an eventful year in 2018-19, with dozens of events and new studies along
with important acquisitions within the archives and library. Dr. Sandy Placido, a recent PhD from Harvard University, joined the Institute’s research team, a joint hire of the History Department at Queens College and DSI. The Institute is poised for continued growth in the years ahead.
The Institute is engaged in important work focused on how Dominicans are integrating, assimilating, and achieving socioeconomic progress in the United States; and on understanding how a portion of Dominicans have managed to move up the socioeconomic ladder while the majority continue to lag behind.
10/21/19 2:47 PM
