New York has the highest concentration of Puerto Ricans in the world outside Puerto Rico, but Puerto Rican Studies across City University of New York  has consistently been defunded and understaffed, and often a target for political attack. Puerto Rican and Latin Studies (PRLS)  at Brooklyn College has too few tenured lines meet the minimum requirements for a CUNY department at CUNY: only two tenured faculty remain, several courses run only every two or three years, and the department’s operating budget is less than half what it was in the early 1990s, adjusted for inflation.  

Today, according to CUNY, Brooklyn College is nearly 24 percent Latino, but Puerto Rican students say they cannot find enough courses on the history, diaspora and identity of Puerto Ricans on campus.  

This is not a new situation. In 2022, student Maria Hernandez told Brooklyn College Vanguard “there are barely any classes about our history anymore. Maybe one or two a semester, how is that enough for a Latino campus?”  

At that time, the Vanguard reported that PRLS lacked a viable majority of tenured faculty, despite two new faculty being hired. Students expressed fear that it would be merged with another department as had occurred in previous rounds of cutbacks at CUNY in the 1980s and 1990s. Dr.Virginia Sanchez Korrl, a historian who helped shape the field, warned that eliminating tenure lines in ethnic studies amounts to “disciplinary death.” 

When the Puerto Rican Studies Department, the forerunner of PRLS,  was founded in the early 1970s, fewer than 1% of the students at Brooklyn College were Puerto Rican. Despite having thousands of Latino students today, the department has less funding and fewer resources than some directors of the department had several decades previously.  

By 2007 the Center for Puerto Rican Studies, CENTRO, at Hunter College reported  that Puerto Rican Studies programs at CUNY were consistently “diminished… primarily for budgetary reasons” whenever those programs were placed under the purview of other ethnic studies departments. 

Students say these pressures continue today and are part of a larger pattern of reducing humanities classes. During the COVID-era budget cuts, CUNY eliminated over 3,000 adjunct class sections, disproportionately affecting humanities programs.  

“This is about what stories get told, and which ones get erased,” said Dr. Yarimar Bonilla, director of CENTRO, during a 2023 public panel on austerity and Puerto Rican cultural institutions. “Ethnic studies programs are structurally underfunded because they challenge the status quo. That is not accidental.” 

Bonilla has also warned that austerity measures typically accompany periods of political mobilization for marginalized people. 

“In times of crisis, policing, colonialism, Palestine, there is always pressure to shrink the spaces where critical conversations happen.” 

In 2024, CUNY received a $5 million grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation to continue and expand the Black, Race, and Ethnic Studies Initiative (BRESI), allowing Brooklyn College, among other schools, to offer new courses, support academic research, and offer internships. But experts say BRESI cannot reverse decades of erosion. 

“This is patchwork,” an ethnic studies researcher said during a public BRESI briefing in 2022. “Useful, but not a substitute for rebuilding what decades of cuts eroded.” 

Some PRLS students have noted a relationship between CUNY’s funding priorities and the wider national atmosphere on Palestine activism. After pro-Palestine demonstrations on campuses nationwide, administrators faced pressure from donors, elected officials, and the media to more rigorously scrutinize curriculum and activism taking place in ethnic studies environments. Some students argue that austerity leaves PRLS especially vulnerable to these pressures. 

Some PRLS students say the climate at CUNY has shifted further in the past year, shaped by national backlash to pro-Palestine demonstrations and new campus disciplinary practices. Students at multiple CUNY campuses reported receiving misconduct charges related to protest actions, including charges for “failures to comply,” “disruptive conduct,” and “unauthorized demonstration.” Brooklyn College’s Undergraduate Student Government and administration did not respond to repeated requests for  comment.   

Puerto Rican Alliance’s (PRA) president Angelina Rivera neologized the political climate surrounding ethnic studies as “the broader political environment exacerbated by campus protests,” referencing the campus conduct charges against students across CUNY related to the protests from the previous spring. She told the audience at the Encuentro event that “Our biggest issue as a club now is repression from the administration, especially against political activism,” in reference to the focus on PRLS and solidarity organizing.  

 “Even now, there are a lot of students facing conduct charges we’re still worrying about,” Rivera added. 

While PRLS fights for stability, other departments are growing. Jewish Studies programs across CUNY have received millions in philanthropic donations, including a $3 million donation to CUNY Queens College’s Jewish Studies program in 2023.  

Meanwhile, STEM programs receive more consistent investment: CUNY received $18 million in National Science Foundation STEM grants in 2023-2024. Brooklyn College’s new science facilities were funded through state capital allocations exceeding $100 million over the past decade.  

“STEM expansion is funded as the future,” Bonilla noted in the 2022 panel. “But communities also need the tools to understand power, race, and history. When those programs shrink, students lose more than classes, they lose the language to understand their world.” 

Patriotic feeling was in the air at a Veterans Day event at the Federation of Italian Organizations of Brooklyn (FIAO) in Bath Beach. Officials who came out were Council Member Susan Zhuang of District 43 and Assembly Member William Colton, who honored local veterans on November 12th. 

Forty-five veterans attended the event at FIAO, representing many branches of the military, including the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines, and Coast Guard. 

Many were very excited to talk to the officials and make a personal connection with the people who run the area. The veterans got thank-you cards from children at P.S. 186.

Susan Zhuang says, “It was an honor to join Assemblyman Colton in recognizing the veterans who have served our community with such courage and commitment. Honoring their services is important, but matching that respect with real action is even more important.” She promised to keep working with her colleagues to expand and improve benefits and services, and to ensure South Brooklyn won’t be overlooked. 

The ceremony opened with Deacon Anthony Mammoliti of St. Dominic’s Roman Catholic Church, who began with a prayer. Deacon Anthony was an army veteran himself who was recognized for his decades of service. The ceremony ended with another prayer from Iman Ahmed Ali of IQRA Masjid, a community non-profit. 

Another local official, Assemblyman William Colton, reminded everyone in the room about the importance of Veterans Day. “Each one of them put their life on to serve the American people, supported by their families, who make sacrifices every day so they can answer the call of duty… These ceremonies are meant to remind everyone of the important role veterans have played in the life of our country. No words can express our gratitude for all they have given and continue to give. We need to provide for our veterans. We need to make sure the government works for you.” 

   The Eastern Queens Alliance (EQA), a coalition that addresses conflicts around community sustainability, partnered with Con Edison over the summer to make a street lot into a maintained garden for the Laurelton community. 

    Community gardens have been in distress over the past few months, according to NBC New York and other news organizations, as they have been on the brink of shutting down due to the city government’s plans to sell the land to developers. However, this Queens community garden is here to stay, as it is now owned by EQA. 

   “The location was an unused street bed. It has for years been a blight on the community,” said Barbara E. Brown, Chairperson at EQA. 

   The lot was used as an illegal car and dump site. This was bad news for the community as the lot sits beside the Idelwild Environmental Center and the Blue Belt system of Idelwild wetlands. 

   EQA was able to get possession of the vacant land by obtaining permission from the New York City Department of Transportation (NYCDOT) to make the abandoned lot into a community peace garden. 

   “Just preparing the land for a viable garden has been difficult because of prior misuse,” said Brown. 

   Volunteers have been floating in and out of the garden weekly since August 2025, with some days being more hands-on than others. This community garden is set to be completed later this year.  

   “During the summer, we’ll probably get maybe two corporate volunteer groups of about 20 people coming in for a day to do major projects,” said Harold Joseph, the gardener designated to this garden. “Consistently, we usually get around five people during spring and summer.”

   Many Laurelton residents are not new to volunteering, as they have been advocates for the revival of their Queens community. Gardener and Laurelton resident, Diana Alleyson-Wilson, is no different: “It [community gardens] brings people together. We get to know our neighbors because we don’t know our neighbors, we don’t know people, we see people in passing, but these community gardens get us communicating.”

   The Laurelton community is a wetlands area, making the community garden compatible with environmental and ecological lifestyles. 

   “Aesthetically, it [the community garden] will serve to beautify the area,” Brown said. The community garden not only provides a serene space, but it also gives opportunities for people in the community to get involved and volunteer their time and passion to gardening projects.

   “It offers opportunities for fostering biodiversity, mindfulness through walking of the labyrinth, and a variety of possible community-wide activities offered by EQA and the center,” Brown said. 

   EQA prides itself on being an organization focused on supporting sustainable practices. The making of the garden will also follow this clause. “We are trying to use more native low-maintenance plantings here,” Joseph said, which will require a smaller amount of water. 

   “We are also trying to cut down on the space so we wouldn’t have to rely on mowing the space itself,” he said. 

   Householders within this community are trusting of community gardens as they allow more people to be attuned with each other and their environment. “It [Community Gardens] is about the coexistence of us all and recognizing that we all need to coexist with each other,” Alleyson-Wilson said. 

“Mutually Assured Destruction,” the guiding principle that many people suppose has kept the world free from nuclear war for the past 80 years, was challenged by Charles J. Moxley, Jr., author, arbitrator, and mediator, in a book talk he gave at Cardozo Law Institute on September 16. 

Moxley claims that this long-held theory of nuclear deterrence is antiquated and not equipped to deal with modern day threats, arguing there is an urgent need to develop laws that address directly the legality and usage of nuclear weapons. 

Moxley discussed his new book, “Nuclear Weapons and International Law: Existential Risks of Nuclear War and Deterrence Through A Legal Lens” at a free lecture at the law institute, moderated by Brett Jones, a Cardozo Fellow and instructor in the Human Rights and Atrocity Prevention (HRAP) Clinic.

Moxley’s work analyzes the United States’s own articulated legal principles in regards to the use of nuclear weapons, and whether the use of such weapons can be justified even under its own vague legal framework. He claims that the use of these weapons cannot be justified legally and that neither we, nor our key nuclear adversaries adhere to already existing policies. He emphasized that a concrete legal language must be created to address nuclear weapons directly in order to lower the risk of nuclear conflict in our lifetime. 

Five specific 2024 nuclear threats, including the Russian war in Ukraine, the rapid expansion and diversification of China’s nuclear arsenal, opportunistic aggression from North Korea, the United State’s extended commitment to its allies and policy of deterrence, and the rapid modernization of the United States nuclear defense program were identified by the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a bipartisan non-profit research organization which focuses on identifying and addressing the greatest threats the world faces today.

 Uncomfortable questions arise as tension mounts between the United States and its opposing world powers. Should we be asking ourselves: Will we see nuclear conflict in our lifetime, what does that look like, and what can be materially done to prevent it? 

“I think for many of us that idea is scary, right?” Jones, the moderator said, “and for many people that fear sometimes prevents us from doing.”

Moxley said that the long-held traditional strategy of Mutually Assured Destruction as a form of deterrence is not enough to prevent nuclear fallout anymore, citing that the development of more accurate, lower-yield, nuclear weapons undermines the theory of Mutually Assured Destruction, and that there is an increasing need for a stronger legal language that addresses the modern day threats. 

For years the international community has relied on the principle of Mutually Assured Destruction to keep us safe from nuclear conflict. This is the idea that if one world power were to launch a nuclear weapon at another, the counter-attack would be carried out with such intensity that both acting states would be completely destroyed, therefore neither state would launch a nuclear attack to begin with.

“I’m one of the only people talking about this,” Moxley said. He claimed that people, including world leaders, are in a “psychological state of denial,” about the reality of the threat of nuclear conflict.

In 2024 the International Criminal Court, or ICJ, ruled unanimously that, “There is in neither customary nor conventional international law any specific authorization of the threat or use of nuclear weapons,” while simultaneously ruling that, “there is in neither customary nor conventional international law any comprehensive and universal prohibition of the threat or use of nuclear weapons as such.”

This legal gray area and apparent gap in international law Moxley suggested, opens the entire world up to a higher risk of nuclear conflict. In an interview with the Brooklyn News Service, Moxley said that he is “concerned” about the potential of some kind of nuclear conflict and that many people “have shut their eyes” to the issue itself. He believes it is by luck only that we have been spared from all-out nuclear war. What Moxley hopes to accomplish with his book is to put the wheels in motion to reassess the current laws and policy or lack thereof surrounding nuclear weapons and the legality of their usage.

Moxley pointed out that there is not even a set definition for a low yield nuclear weapon, and that by the United States standards, a low yield nuclear weapon may be anywhere from five to thirty kilotons. As a frame of reference, the two bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki were 15, and 21 kilotons respectively. 

Even a highly accurate low yield nuclear missile launched at a submarine in an extremely isolated area of the ocean, while meeting the vague criteria and policy for a legal use of nuclear weapons, as defined by the U.S Manual of War, would cause catastrophic damage to the ocean’s ecosystem via radiation and further emphasizes the urgent need for a reassessment of the current policy.

A simulation conducted by Princeton found that the launch of one low yield nuclear weapon in a conflict between the United States and Russia would likely result in 91.5 million casualties within the first few hours of the launch. The resulting nuclear fallout, radiation, and cooling of the earth’s atmosphere would result in the deaths of millions more.

Moxley says, however, that the law is one very small mechanism in the larger picture of global and nuclear conflict. When it comes to nuclear weapons, “the law hasn’t come to the forefront,” he said, “it doesn’t have the impact it should–it must have.”

Moxley repeated several times that while he is concerned about the geopolitical state of the world, hope is not lost. There is still time to reassess our policies and develop new laws. Jones commented as the lecture came to a close, “If there is no effort, there is no progress.”

Goode lost two family members in the attacks, one a firefighter, the other, a volunteer who fell sick years later. This gave the event a special significance to Goode, whose collection featured pieces inspired directly by the firefighters and volunteers who were there in 2001. 

The free event was advertised as a fashion show with an emphasis on the remembrance of 9/11 and strengthening of neighborhood ties, but some audience members were left confused by a multitude of unrelated performances and an unclear timeline.

The show was to begin at 6pm with the reading of a tribute poem about 9/11, followed by a moment of silence. It didn’t begin until 7:30 pm with spoken word poet and motivational speaker, Kamal Speaks, performing several poems about women and physical intimacy. There was a moment of silence at the beginning, but for women who respect themselves rather than for 9/11 victims. 

The fashion designs were inspired by the garden’s natural elements, the city environment, as well as 9/11’s fallen heroes. Unfortunately, by the time the models took the runway, the sun had set and there was only enough light to see where the models entered, making it difficult for the audience to appreciate Goode’s designs.

During intermission, various rappers performed. One, Mike Hayes, was particularly emotional rapping about the recent loss of his brother. In his lines he claimed to have a weapon on him at that moment, leading some in the audience to leave. 

After several hours the show circled back to 9/11 and finally concluded with the reading of the 9/11 tribute poem and a moment of silence.

Goode, the founder of the Goode Fashion Institute, aims to “democratize fashion,” through attempting to create an accessible place for artists and fashion enthusiasts to gather and collaborate drawing parallels to the YMCA. His central mission is to “create opportunities for individuals who want to tap into their full potential and express themselves both intellectually and creatively,” likely explaining the seemingly random performances.

The Rodale Pleasant Park Community Garden organized the event. What differentiates this community garden from similar gardens in the city is its level of accessibility to non-garden members. Jennifer Johnson, 28, is not a member of the community garden but lives in the neighborhood and frequents it often.  “I love this place,” Johnson said, “It’s quiet, it’s nice, and most of these community gardens don’t let any non-members in.”

Established in early 1990s, the garden was in disrepair until 1998, when a neighborhood based social services group, Little Sisters of Assumption, began to clear the space and plant high-yield and nutritionally dense crops for community members.

In 2003, the garden underwent further renovations thanks to the collaboration of community members and the New York Restoration Project, or NYRP. Together they installed additional vegetable beds, provided comfortable common areas, and a number of eco-friendly amenities to further elevate the garden. Johnson said that the crops grown in the garden are then shared by members to those in the neighborhood. 

For Johnson, her attendance at the event last night was in her words, “pure happenstance.” “I was just walking by and these guys said yo, do you wanna see a fashion show?” said Johnson. 

Monday, September 2, 2024 marked the annual celebration of the J’Ouvert and West Indian American Day Carnival. A Brooklyn tradition rooted in hundreds of years of history and culture, the annual Carnival is a celebration of the many diverse cultures across the West Indian and Caribbean islands. The event has long been organized by the West Indian American Day Carnival Association.

Celebrations began at daybreak with the traditional playing of steel drums. Several hours into the parade, around 2:35pm, a gunman opened fire into the crowd along the Eastern Parkway parade route, leaving one dead and four others injured, as reported by the AP.

In a statement, NYPD Chief of Patrol John Chell said this was not believed to be a random attack. The Carnival festivities continued on into the evening, parade-goers undeterred by the shooting. 

The streets of Brooklyn were lined with hundreds of flags representing countries of the West Indian and Caribbean islands such as Trinidad and Tobago, Barbados, Jamaica, and Haiti, just to name a few. Many Carnival participants donned fantastical feathered masks and brightly colored costumes. These costumes take influence from history, politics, culture, and elements from both the spiritual and natural world.

The calypso music and thousands dancing in the street reflected a celebratory energy.

 Mary Cadette, a 58-year-old woman flag vendor originally from St. Lucia said, “This is one of my favorite times of the year, I see a lot of old friends.”

The parade is not only enjoyed by those of West Indian and Caribbean descent. As one of the world’s largest annual celebrations of Caribbean culture, the event draws in millions of spectators from all backgrounds. 

Leanne Ryan, a 34-year-old woman originally from Connecticut and now living in Park Slope, attended the event with her two children. 

“It’s important to me that my kids grow up around different cultures,” Ryan said. “Besides, what kid doesn’t like a parade?” 

According to the West Indian American Day Carnival Association, the annual celebrations originated in Harlem in the 1930s. It was organized by a Trinidadian woman named Jessie Wardell and her friends. Eventually the celebration moved to Brooklyn in the 1960s, led by a Trinidadian man named Rufus Goring.

The origins of J’Ouvert, or, ‘daybreak’, actually dates back hundreds of years originating in Trinidad. Through colonialism and the slave trade, these traditions spread throughout the West Indian and Caribbean Islands. When the Caribbean and West Indian people were enslaved however, they were forbidden from carrying out their own cultural traditions or holding or participating in any kind of outdoor celebrations. This gives the bright and loud Carnival of today an even deeper meaning. Beyond a proud celebration of individual heritage, it is a celebration of freedom, expression, and history to be enjoyed by all.

To celebrate Women’s History Month, The Cooper Union collaborated with author and speaker Gloria Steinem On March 18 for their Great Women Live at the Great Hall series, which highlights the progress of women and how to address the contemporary issues hindering progress of women. 

The theme for the panel was overt, acknowledging the progress of women and addressing the issues that inhibit that progress. Laura Sparks, the first woman president of The Cooper Union, moderated the Q+A event.

This sentiment of women’s progress being in dire need of more attention was echoed by the speaker herself, Steinem, at the panel.

“In the beginning of the Women’s movement, we had a history of reinventing what women’s rights meant for us, being more than just a housewife or going into the working field,” said  Steinem.

Guests were excited to be in the presence of feminist global changemakers. 

“Seeing feminist icons like Gloria Steinem feels so surreal to me,” said Laura Stromer, an event attendee. “Having women like her be on the forefront discussing these issues with women like us feels impactful.” 

Many say the “future is female,” but in the history of the world, men have always been at the forefront of social change and women have been largely left out. 

Even within the political sphere for social change, the women always are behind in political representation. According to U.N women.org, there were only 10 women Heads of State and 13 women Heads of Government across 22 countries.  

The concept of women finally being recognized in the different spheres of social change was also confirmed by Sparks, who acknowledged the many voices of great women at the Great Hall, one who ran for  president of the United States in 2016.

“With the many greats who evoked their presence here at the Great Hall in Cooper Union, Former Secretary Of State, Hilary Clinton really left me in awe,” said Sparks. “Her giving us this note of gratitude, during the height of journalists and reporters censorship during Trump’s presidency really gave us as women conviction to speak out against wrongdoings of the world.”

There was this  underlying flicker of hope during the panel, which was the progress of women’s rights, and the tangible things people can do to show support for the women’s movement that both Sparks and Steinem recognized.

“Being president of the Cooper Union feels like I have a duty to my fellow sisters to make sure spaces for women exist,” said Sparks. “Whether it be holding panels, spoken word or dance recitals all in the name of women’s representation, I’m here for it.” 

Steinem acknowledged that in meeting situations, a circle for women is more beneficial than a hierarchical structure. 

“Well anything that is in a circle is better than a hierarchy, because instead of a hierarchical  board room, we have this circle, metaphorically, to speak about our grievances as women,” said Steinem. “Revolutions are like trees, not built from the top down but built bottom up.”

Steinem also stressed this idea that what we all do can have consequences. She made sure that was reverberated in the last moments of the panel.

“Just remembering that and everything we do matters, which is very helpful, otherwise, it seems impossible to think of the end result,” said Steinem.

Anti-Semitic attacks in New York City increased by 275% this year according to recent New York Police Department crime statistics. With this alarming rise in hate crimes, City Councilwoman Julie Menin of Community District 5 (the Upper East Side of Manhattan) held a virtual town hall meeting with several other community leaders Feb. 8, to discuss what can be done to combat this frightening trend.

“I’m the daughter of a Holocaust survivor and my grandfather died in the Holocaust, and I feel very strongly about the need to tackle this,” Menin said.

Education was their primary concern, with many panelists stressing the importance of teaching and learning about the Holocaust to better understand the ongoing threats against Jewish communities. Ignorance surrounding Jewish history is partly to blame for many hate crimes, the panelists said.

Eric Donowitz, Council Member from CD 11 explained why Holocaust education should be top priority, “I was a public school teacher and I had students – who could not identify a swastika. Students who didn’t know what a Nazi was and didn’t have any real meaningful knowledge of the Holocaust,” he said.

Facing History and Ourselves, a non-profit organization which works with teachers and students in the schools, whose goal is to, “use lessons of history to challenge teachers and their students to stand up to bigotry and hate,” is working in that direction. Their lessons and workshops also focus on religious intolerance in general, as well as racism, genocide and mass violence and human rights. Having students analyze history strengthens their socio-emotional skills and helps them, according to Facing History, to “reflect on the choices they confront today and consider how they can make a difference.”

With NYC’s most recent attack involving a 15-year-old-boy assaulting a Hasidic man in Brooklyn’s Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood, there is a clear need for more education amongst the city’s youth.

Jonah Boyarin, the Jewish Community Liaison at the NYC Commission on Human Rights, also attended, explaining that the public needs education to push back against harmful conspiracy theories and misinformation. Boyarin stated, “Anti-Semitism teaches people to blame the problems–or their perceived problems–on Jews.”

Boyarin mentioned the Pittsburgh Synagogue Shooting, in which a white nationalist killed 11 Jewish people in 2018. The shooter was well known for spouting conspiracy theories such as Jewish people controlling the government and bringing in immigrants to dilute the white race. Jewish communities being blamed for societal catastrophes goes back centuries. Some have blamed the community for everything from the communist revolution to the 2008 financial crisis, and in recent times, for the spread of COVID-19.

At the end of it all, one message was emphasized, “if hate can be taught, hate can be also unlearned,” as said by Adam Rosenberg of the Anti-Defamation League. It was also about the community helping their own, with the first step being to learn about the sufferings of your neighbors and stand by them during times of crisis.

“Whites increasingly see racism as a zero-sum game that they are losing,” said Heather McGhee a newly appointed lecturer at The City University of New York’s (CUNY) School of Labor and Urban Studies.

McGhee was discussing her book “The Sum of Us: What Racism Costs Everyone and How We Can Prosper Together” on Zoom with Deepak Bhargava as he was welcoming her to the program.

“I quit my job in 2017 and set off across the country. I went from California to Mississippi to Maine and back again multiple times,” McGhee said on her journey to writing this book. Throughout her travels she had one question. She wanted to know why we all can’t have “nice things.”

No, she isn’t talking about self-driving cars or Gucci bags. She is talking about public swimming pools, subsidized higher education, universal childcare, affordable healthcare, and paid family leave.

McGhee refers to zero-sum and how white supremacy deprives people of “nice things.” The people that are deprived include white people as well as people of color. She mentions a story about a pool in Montgomery, Ala. When white Americans were told that they would have to integrate the pool they decided to drain and cement it. Nobody, white or black, has been able to enjoy it since they closed it down in 1959.

McGhee also mentioned wages. She questions why someone should survive on $7.25, where someone else is making 1000 times more. “An average worker would have to work 1,000 years to make what the CEO makes in a year,” McGhee said. She pointed out that when everyone gets together they can demand justice. That happened recently with the Fight for $15 movement when fast-food workers supported each other to raise minimum wage to $15 an hour in the country.

McGhee’s book was released in Feb. 2021 and has spent 10 weeks on The New York Times best seller. It was also long listed for the National Book Award and the Carnegie Medal for excellence in non-fiction.

McGhee is a lecturer at the School of Labor and Urban Studies in her first semester. The CUNY school has been a leader in adult and worker education for over 30 years. It started with 52 students and now has more than 1,200 adult and traditional aged students enrolled in undergraduate and graduate programs.