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Tuesday, April 18, 2017 | Vol. XCI, Issue 22 | Binghamton University | bupipedream.com
The Free Word on Campus Since 1946
County exec. aims to keep grads local Student Board of Advisors program looks to increase student retention Orlaith McCaffrey Pipe Dream Sports
A new initiative between Broome County and local students aims to promote youth civic engagement and create ideas to counter “brain drain” — or the departure of young, educated professionals from the area. On Monday at the Broome County Office Building, County Executive Jason Garnar announced the formation of the Student Board of Advisors, a youth council that will provide local government officials with students’ perspectives on community issues. “Bringing young people together with the local government will give us an opportunity to tap into the creativity, energy and passion which may have previously been overlooked,” Garnar said. “We’ve never done anything like this before and I think this board has tremendous potential.”
SEE GARNER PAGE 2
Michael Contegni/Photography Editor Gov. Andrew Cuomo speaks at Binghamton University on Tuesday, Feb. 7 to promote his executive budget proposal. During the talk, Cuomo announced his plan to make public colleges in New York tuitionfree for middle-class families.
NYS to offer free tuition starting fall '17
SUNY, CUNY schools to become tuition-free for families making less than $100,000 Gabriella Weick Assistant News Editor
On April 7, New York state Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced the passage of the FY 2018 state budget. The budget includes the introduction of the Excelsior Scholarship, which will provide tuition-free public college for families in New York state making up to $125,000 a year.
Photo provided by Jonathan Cohen/Binghamton University Pictured: Binghamton University President Harvey Stenger poses in his office in the Couper Administration Building.
Stenger reflects on five years as president of BU Pipe Dream sat down to discuss growth of University, relations to city of Binghamton Gabriella Weick Assistant News Editor
Pipe Dream sat down with Binghamton University President Harvey Stenger to reflect on his first five years in office and discuss what he hopes to accomplish in the next five years. The interview has been edited for length and clarity. Pipe Dream: What do you think are the most important accomplishments you’ve contributed to in the past five years at Binghamton University?
Harvey Stenger: Me, personally, I have not done much. I’ve just helped other people identify things they can work on that I think will help improve the University. One of the things that I knew we were great at was undergraduate education; we had great students, we had great faculty, but a university needs to be a little bit more than that. So, setting the expectation and finding the resources necessary to grow our graduate programs was one of the things that I wanted us to be successful at, and I think we have.
According to the Cuomo’s press release, the program will be rolled out over three years; it will begin with New Yorkers making up to $100,000 annually in fall 2017, $110,000 in 2018 and finally increase to $125,000 in 2019. Almost 940,000 New Yorkers will be eligible for the program, which will be applicable at all SUNY and CUNY schools. “This budget enacts the Middle Class
Recovery Act to continue the Empire State’s upward trajectory and creates a path forward for those striving to get ahead,” Cuomo said in a statement. “By making college at our world-class public universities tuition-free, we have established a national model for access to higher education, and achieved another New York first.” Students entering Binghamton
University who are eligible will benefit from the scholarship. BU President Harvey Stenger said in a statement that the University will now be an option for more New Yorkers looking to go to college. “Governor Cuomo has been a longtime friend of SUNY schools in New York state, and Binghamton University is no
SEE TUITION PAGE 2
We’ve increased our graduate enrollment significantly, we’ve grown our faculty by almost 25 percent. I think it’s been a combination of growing smart, taking the resources you get when you grow and investing them smartly, and we chose to invest them in expanding opportunities for students in graduate education and in research. PD: How has the University changed in the last five years, and what are you most proud of? HS: The student body hasn’t changed; they’re still as smart and as interactive and as engaged as they were when I got here, and that’s great. Sometimes, when you grow, you might lose that character because you have more students and you didn’t perhaps focus on the quality of students. But we’ve attracted very strong students — not just by measure of SATs and GPAs — but also by their desire to be engaged. PD: What do you consider your biggest failure of the past five years, and what do you wish you’d done differently? What do you plan on doing differently in the future? HS: You have to find failures in life, because if you don’t fail you’re probably not pushing the envelope hard enough. If I were to say the failure I learned the most about is to manage uncertainty. For example, in 2014, our undergraduate population — specifically our freshman population — grew faster than we had anticipated. At the same time, we were still in the beginning phases of the Student Wing renovations, so we had 30 classrooms offline. That was probably the biggest mistake that we made; you look back and say, ‘Could we have done this differently?’ I also look at the future now as being
Downtown blue-light system concerns Binghamton activists
SEE STENGER PAGE 2
SEE BLUE LIGHT PAGE 3
Local community groups criticize divisive qualities of new West Side safety measure Jillian Forstadt Staff Writer
Last month, Binghamton Mayor Rich David announced an initiative, funded by Binghamton University, to implement license plate-reading cameras around the city of Binghamton and to extend the bluelight system to Downtown Binghamton. The plan, however, was met with criticism from residents and students who believe it will perpetuate community divisions and endanger minority students. Student groups like the Black Student Union have condemned the policy, and community groups have mobilized against the blue-light initiative, critiquing it for misrepresenting issues affecting Broome County residents. Justice and Unity for the Southern Tier, a local nonprofit advocating for the rights of people of color and inmates, led the policy’s opposition. Michael Stephens, a member of the organization and a second-year graduate student studying sociology, said the initiative prioritizes student safety over low-income and minority residents. “This sends a message that there is a select segment of the Binghamton community — particularly the wealthier,
more privileged, seasonal student residents of the city — who must be ‘protected’ from some danger, which the policy implies is the poorer, non-university affiliated population of the city,” Stephens wrote in an email. Epiphany Muñoz, BU X-Fact’r Step Team secretary and a senior doublemajoring in sociology and Africana studies, said students fail to understand the University’s impact locally. “For students to come together and implement something like this without even considering the impact on the people who have to live here is entitled, problematic and perpetrates an ‘us vs. them’ narrative,” Munoz wrote in an email. After an incident of racial harassment targeting X-Fact’r demonstrated what many perceived as police indifference toward students of color, concerns about institutional racism within the local justice system have escalated. Many have called for reform at the meetings and protests supporting X-Fact’r, and blamed police indifference as a primary issue. Rachelle Jereza, a member of Justice and Unity for the Southern Tier and a second-year graduate student studying sociology, said she feared blue-light expansion will