EDUCATION | Driving tomorrow’s achievements
26 November 2008
College Known for Welcoming Immigrants, New Students
Students say New York’s Queens College is “hidden gem”
New York — In this international city, where roughly one-third of residents are foreign-born, there is a borough called Queens, where nearly one-half of residents are foreign-born. In this borough is Queens College, whose tree-lined quadrangle is filled with the chatter of students speaking Hindi, Korean, Spanish, as well as English.
Queens College, situated on a breezy rise, offers a visitor a picture-perfect view of mid-town Manhattan and the iconic Empire State Building. Only a few kilometers away are two of New York’s prestigious, private higher-education institutions: Columbia University and New York University.
Queens College’s 19,300 students represent a mosaic of cultural backgrounds, and one-third of them are the first people in their families to attend college. “That’s what is so rich about the education at a place like Queens,” said college President James Muyskens. (See “One New York City Neighborhood Is a World of Religious Diversity.”)
Muyskens said the student body at a renowned public university where he formerly taught philosophy “typically had upper-middle-class Americans who shared so many values.” He finds the diversity at Queens invigorating.
The college, which is located in Flushing, Queens, has been getting recognition lately for providing an affordable, quality education to local young people. Its tuition is only $4,000 per year for New York State residents (undergraduates), one-tenth the cost of some private U.S. colleges and universities.
In the first decades after the college was founded in 1937, many of its students came from Catholic and Jewish families that had emigrated from Europe. Today, students come from the new immigrant communities being established in New York, especially from families who come from Latin America, and most recently from China, India and Russia.
Whatever conflicts their home countries may be embroiled in, students at Queens seem to leave hostilities behind when they come to campus.
Adnan Nawaz, a biology student born in Pakistan, is president of the Muslim Students Association of Queens College. The group’s two small prayer rooms in the Student Union building — one for men, the other for women — are across the hall from the meeting room of Hillel, the Jewish student organization.
Sporting a full beard, black skullcap and long, collarless Pakistani-style shirt one recent afternoon, Nawaz said members of the Muslim Students Association use the table tennis and billiards tables in Hillel’s spacious premises. “They always share with us,” he said.
That attitude extends to the student government, which in recent years has established a tradition of shared leadership between the two biggest campus religions: If the president is Muslim, the vice president is Jewish, and vice versa.
In its 2008 edition, the Kaplan/Newsweek How to Get into College guide names Queens as one of “The 25 Hottest Schools in America.”
In the 1970s and 1980s, the college had an open admissions policy under which anyone with a high school diploma could enroll. The policy had “disastrous” academic consequences, said Joseph Bertolino, the college’s vice president for student affairs. But since then, Queens College gradually has raised its standards. A growing number of its students are recruited from community colleges, where they first prove themselves by earning a two-year diploma.
Contrasting the college to the elite “Ivy League” universities, the guide says, “The school’s biggest claim to fame is the several generations of lawyers, doctors and other professionals who could not afford the Ivies and say Queens changed their lives.” (Queens College is part of the City University of New York.)
Professional success, however, requires much determination from Queens College students. The modest background of some Queens College graduates is undoubtedly a reason for their professional success. Their work lives begin early: Many of the students have a job alongside their studies. “Many contribute to their extended family household,” Bertolino said.
According to Bertolino, some students are living in the United States illegally. (Generally, colleges in America are not required to check students’ immigration status.) Bertolino said there is proposed legislation — the Development, Relief and Education for Alien Minors Act, known as the “Dream Act” — that would enable undocumented people who graduate from college to eventually get citizenship.
Supporters say the bill, which has been introduced but did not make it out of committee for several years, is likely to be included in a comprehensive reform of immigration laws expected in the next few years.
Jonathan Vazcones, whose parents emigrated legally from Ecuador, said he turned down two other institutions to come to Queens. “It’s much more personal here,” he said. “Professors know your name. Queens College is a hidden gem.”
For more information see Study in the U.S on America.gov.
