CUNY Chancellor Booed, Criticized at Higher Education Conference

At “The Future of Higher Education” conference’s keynote panel discussion on Thursday evening, New School President David Van Zandt was barely able to get through his introduction of City University of New York Chancellor Matthew Goldstein, his voice overpowered by the loud coughs and frequent boos of those in attendance.

Tishman Auditorium hosted the discussion, which kicked off the two-day event and 26th installment of the Social Research conference series at The New School. The conference, founded by New School for Social Research professor Arien Mack in 1988, is sponsored by the quarterly journal Social Research, which Mack has edited since 1970.

Van Zandt and Goldstein were featured on a panel that included Milano Dean Neil Grabois, Cooper Union President Jamshed Bharucha, and University of Chicago President Robert Zimmer. The program asked the question “What Ought Universities Look Like in 20-30 Years?” and began with a list of statistics – among them, the United States spends the most money in the world on higher education, and student loans have increased by 25 percent since the beginning of the financial crisis.

But it was Goldstein’s presence that attracted the most attention. With the CUNY tuition dilemma still fresh on the minds of students and professors alike, many attendees in the near-capacity crowd at Tishman Auditorium used the program as an opportunity to make a public spectacle of the CUNY chancellor.

The evening proceeded relatively normally until the question and answer period, when attendees were able to direct their inquiries toward individual members of the panel. During the Q&A, one student shouted out and initiated what would be the first of a series of Occupy Wall Street-style “mic-checks” that interrupted the discussion.

“CUNY was free for over 100 years. Under the leadership of Goldstein, black and Latino youths have less of an opportunity for higher education,” the student yelled. Another student followed, criticizing the failure of CUNY to provide all adjunct assistant professors with health care.

Shortly after, a CUNY professor addressed Goldstein directly, saying that he has noticed a deterioration in the liberal arts classes at CUNY within the last year. Following much applause, Goldstein only said that “It has gotten better within the last 10 to 12 years.”

Two female attendees questioned the panelists on why there were no women on the panel, and attendees continued to yell and shout until Mack finally called the event to an end. At that point, another mic-check was directed towards Goldstein, asking why he could spend $15 million on security.

The discussion ended on a tense note, with the panelists walking off the stage and ignoring any further questions as attendees continued to shout at the CUNY chancellor.