 |  | About a month ago, while you were at the beach and I was pulling together the August dispatch, I was tempted to give you an update on enrollment. But LaGuardia starts late (Sept. 5), students change their minds during the first week of classes (“My boss changed my work schedule and now I can’t take math…”), and we depend on info from CUNY HQ the timing of which we don’t control. So I held off, hoping to have a clearer picture for this edition. Here goes: There is some noise in the data – our dual-enrolled high school students aren’t in the system yet, for example – but it looks like our enrollment of associate degree students is up nine percent year-over-year. This is fantastic. It’s the biggest increase we’ve experienced since the devastation of the pandemic, when we lost one-third of our students. It is the second-largest increase among all CUNY colleges (community and four-year). Only Lower Manhattan rival BMCC is ahead of us – kudos to them. (Yes, there will be spying.) Much of our increase is new students (encouraging considering demographic headwinds), but we’re also doing well with students who transfer in from other colleges, “re-admits” (students who left LaGuardia for a semester or more and are now coming back to finish up), and, of course, returning students. Enrollment in our Adult and Continuing Education programs is also growing at a healthy clip. FY 24 enrollment in ACE jumped twelve percent over FY 23. Success accrues to the college that gives its students what they want.
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Opening Sessions Event Focuses on Career Readiness | |
On September 4 faculty and staff gathered for Opening Sessions, a start of the school year event akin to faculty convocation. Planned by a committee chaired by Cristina Natale of our administration division, and professor of health sciences Jasmine Edwards, this year’s them was “Career Readiness & Pathways: Guiding Students Towards Success in Education and Beyond.” Dr. Niesha Taylor, Director of Career Readiness at the National Association of Colleges and Employers, gave a compelling keynote address. Yours truly provided a brief college update and shared the results of an important new study on labor market trends and educational requirements for good jobs in high growth sectors of the US economy through 2031. Insomniacs can view my thirty-two-minute talk here. The report I reference, from the Center on Education and the Workforce at Georgetown University, can be viewed here. | |
Pinning Ceremony on Sept 3 for Certified Clinical Medical Assistants | |
Just before the semester started, we had a graduation event. Say what? Long-time subscribers will recall that our non-degree workforce training programs in the ACE Division run year-round, without regard to the more traditional academic calendar of our associate degree programs. So it didn’t raise an eyebrow around here when we held a graduation and pinning ceremony in the Little Theatre for forty newly minted medical assistants two days before the start of the fall term. Shout-outs to valedictorian Chelsea Bendeck and salutatorians Diosdado Javellana and Islem Taveras. LaGuardia’s CCMA program has boasted a 100% pass rate on the national CCMA certification exams (National Health Career Association: EKG Technician, Phlebotomist, and CCMA) for the past four years. If you don’t like how your doctor’s assistant draws your blood, insist on a LaGuardia-trained Medical Assistant. | | |
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The U.S. National Science Foundation recently awarded $530,000 to LaGuardia for professional development for faculty who teach in STEM majors (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math). The award is part of NSF’s Innovation in Two-Year College in STEM Education program, which supports projects that advance innovative, evidence-based practices at community colleges across the country. Dr. Reem Jaafar, a professor in the Math, Engineering and Computer Science Department, and Ljubica Depovic, director of the Center for Teaching and Learning, are the co-principal investigators of LaGuardia’s project. As Dr. Jaafar explained, “With the grant, we plan to investigate the effectiveness of a cohort-based, two-tiered faculty development model that incorporates leadership training and data coaching on persistence in foundational STEM courses.” | |
LaGuardia Launches Artificial Intelligence Certificate Program | |
LaGuardia’s Division of Adult and Continuing Education is offering a new Artificial Intelligence Certificate Program, with curriculum developed in partnership with Intel through its AI Workforce Program. The program is designed to help students and professionals from various fields, such as healthcare, administration, and technology, enhance their careers and understand AI through practical, human-centered approaches. Hannah Weinstock, Senior Director of Workforce Development, says that the program aims to dispel fears about AI and show that everyone can find a place in an AI-driven future. When I called Hannah to fact-check this item I got a friendly chatbot who could explain the program in fifteen languages. Hannah was busy enrolling students. | |
New York City Council Member Julie Won is a tireless advocate for LaGuardia, and after negotiating the particulars of the city’s (jaw-dropping) $116 billion budget she always returns to LIC with generous amounts of capital funding for campus improvements. This year she did better than ever by securing $4.5 million for critical (and decidedly not flashy) infrastructure projects. A most welcome feature of New York State budget policies mandates that the state, in its following fiscal year, provide a 100% match to the capital funds secured by our favorite councilmember. You don’t have to be a math major to know that $9 million is a big deal around here. Yes, the state matching process adds more time to the project schedule, but we’re okay with that. We’re going to use a hefty portion of the funds to upgrade the HVAC systems in Shenker Hall, named for our first president, Dr. Joseph Shenker, who opened the college in 1971 in the building that now bears his name. Another big slug of the funding acquired for us by Councilmember Won will be devoted to refurbishing our pool, which is an asset of significant importance to the community – critical, for example, to after-school programs that teach Queens youngsters how to swim. Environmental science students are pleased that these improvements will lower LaGuardia’s carbon footprint as we replace old, energy-intensive a/c equipment with modern, energy-efficient systems. | |
New Degree Program for Fall ‘24 | |
Speaking of modern building systems and controls, right now you are probably asking yourself, “Hey, who is going to operate and maintain all this cutting-edge climate control, lighting, and life-safety equipment as LaGuardia modernizes its campus?” Great question. Just so happens that this semester we added a new major: Business Administration – Facilities Management. (No matter the race, that old horse Self Interest is always a sure bet.) The program is the first of its kind at a community college in New York State. We designed it in collaboration with the International Facility Management Association Foundation. Students will learn the skills needed to manage and maintain diverse types of physical spaces, from office complexes to warehouses to residential buildings. “With new high-rise buildings dotting the Long Island City skyline and the ongoing challenges of maintaining older structures, the need for facilities managers is more pressing than ever,” said Dionne Miller, PhD, Associate Provost for Academic Affairs, who developed the program. Her partner in this endeavor, Regina Ford Cahill, Chair of the IFMA Foundation, added, “The IFMA Foundation and the NYC Chapter of IFMA played a pivotal role in creating the LaGuardia courses, ensuring that they meet global standards for Facilities Management education.” She added, “I am thrilled that LaGuardia has established this much-needed program.” | |
Sculptor and Fine Arts professor Arthur Simms has a piece on view at New York City’s High Line. The commissioned work, A Totem for the High Line, towers forty feet over the High Line, the unique westside park and walkway itself thirty feet above the street below. (You’ll find Simms’ sculpture near the Northern Spur Preserve at West 16 St.) The site-specific piece is an assemblage of weathered utilitarian materials and personal effects wrapped meticulously in rope. It incorporates a decommissioned utility pole found on Randall’s Island, assorted cables, and discarded license plates from various states, suggesting intertwined journeys across great distances that connect in New York City. Time for you to visit the High Line. | |
LaGuardia Women’s Volleyball Team Spikes Kingsborough | |
As part of our commitment to making LaGuardia a fun, engaging, supportive place to get a college education, with school spirit rivaling that of big, football-obsessed colleges in the South (take that, Georgia Tech), we have been introducing a new inter-collegiate team sport every year since the pandemic passed into the rear-view. The latest addition to Andy Walker’s athletic program: Women’s Volleyball. And guess what – our new LaGuardia squad won their very first match, crushing Kingsborough Community College in Manhattan Beach three to one. Coach Charles Young explained, “We had a slow start and then we woke up.” He called it an “All-around effort,” but singled out Valeria Duque and Daniela Acosta for their hard work. Terrific way to start the season. | | |
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Speaking of sports, the LaGuardia Community 5K Run returns to Long Island City this fall. Runners and walkers of all ages*, abilities, and motivations are welcome to participate. Mark your calendars for Saturday, October 19. The run will begin at 9 a.m. near the C Building, at the intersection of 29th Street and 47th Avenue. We’ll head down Borden Ave to the East River and then back to campus. It’s not the most scenic 5K out there, but we make it fun. Many thanks to Charles Boyce and his firm, Boyce Technologies, Inc., for generously serving (again) as the principal sponsor of the event. Proceeds will support our new Community Health and Wellness Department. *Registration is open to participants aged seven and up. | | | | |
