Fordham students welcomed Vice President Kamala Harris to New York City when she arrived at LaGuardia Airport on Air Force Two on April 14.

The vice president was in town to attend the National Action Network’s 2023 Convention. Two days prior to her arrival, her office reached out to Fordham to invite students to meet her.

Claudia Dabie, a Fordham College at Rose Hill student and a member of Fordham’s Collegiate Science and Technology Entry Program (CSTEP) program, said the moment when Air Force Two landed was “so majestic.” Then the vice president approached the Fordham group.

“She started walking towards us, and she started saying hi. And she was smiling and she’s so nice,” said Dabie. “It was amazing. I loved it.”

Lesley A. Massiah-Arthur, associate vice president and special assistant to the president for government relations at Fordham, said that when the invitation was extended, she jumped at the chance to recruit as many Fordham students as possible.

By reaching out to CSTEP, as well as Fordham’s Higher Education Opportunity Program, the Center for Community Engaged Learning, the Office of Student Involvement, and several members of the Fordham faculty, she was able to send a list of interested students and arrange for transportation from both campuses with the generous support of the office of Fordham President Tania Tetlow.

Massiah-Arthur submitted the names of 135 students and around 70 received invitations from The White House. She said that officials in Harris’ office were so impressed with Fordham’s quick and enthusiastic response, they will be inviting the students who did not receive an invitation to this event to a future event when the vice president returns to New York City.

The invitation is a testament to the University’s standing, she said.

“I still remember to this day the first opportunities that I had to engage with elected officials, and I think it’s important that students get those opportunities,” she said.

“So when this opportunity came up, I didn’t think that it was something we could pass up. Regardless of your political affiliations or your beliefs, there should still be a fundamental belief that engaging in a political dynamic and engaging in democracy is the best way of affirming change. By participating in this opportunity, we’ve taken one more step in doing that.”

—Video by Hector Martinez

On March 15, the American Council on Education announced that Massiah-Arthur and 45 others had been named ACE Fellows for the 2022-2023 academic year. The highly competitive program, which attracts applicants from institutions from across the nation, is designed to strengthen institutions and leadership in U.S. higher education by preparing faculty and staff for senior positions in college and university administration. About 2,500 higher ed leaders have participated in the program.

As part of the fellowship, Massiah-Arthur will join the leadership team of another higher education institution that she will choose this spring. In the fall, she will visit her host institution periodically to observe and work with the president and other senior officers, attend decision-making meetings, and focus on issues of interest. She will also conduct a project of pressing concern to the host institution and seek to implement her findings upon completion of the fellowship placement.

Massiah-Arthur said she’s particularly interested in learning more about how institutions set priorities in moments of crisis, and ultimately, who is responsible for making those decisions? In other words, where exactly does the buck stop?

“If you’ve been at an institution for a certain amount of time, it becomes easy for you to become ingrained in how it works and functions,” she said.

“That’s a good thing because it’s important to know what the mission of the institution is. But by the same token, you might not be able to look at processes for leadership or decision-making in an objective way, because you’ve been ingrained in those thought processes.”

Massiah-Arthur is the first Fordham employee to become an ACE fellow. She said she’s excited to share the knowledge she’s gained from her time at Fordham with the administrators of her host institution and to bring fresh perspectives back when she completes the fellowship.

“I really want to thank Father McShane for his support and for putting forth my nomination. It really means a lot to me that he values not only what I’ve done but that he values the potential of what I can do,” she said.

Fordham’s Collegiate Science Technology and Entry Program (CSTEP), a program that prepares minority and economically disadvantaged students for careers in fields in which they are underrepresented, has helped her find an academic and social home on campus.

So when administrators asked her to participate in early February in a meeting with New York state legislators who will determine how much funding the program receives from the state, she jumped at the chance.

“Anything they need, I’m like, ‘Yeah, I’ll do it,’” said Rosario, a psychology major who commutes to campus from the Riverdale neighborhood in the Bronx.

“I feel like I owe them everything.”

Rosario described Fordham’s CSTEP office as a locus of serendipity, part of her daily routine, where she connects with students she might not otherwise meet and chats with them about internships and research opportunities, among other topics.

“In a cliché way, we are like a community. We’re there for each other, no questions asked,” she said.

An Annual New York State Tradition

Fordham has participated in Advocacy Day, an annual event held over two days in Albany, for the better part of two decades, said Lesley Massiah-Arthur, associate vice president and special assistant to the president for government relations. In the past, that meant busing 40 or so students to the capital; since 2021, however, the meetings have been held via Zoom. On Feb 1 and 2, 60 Fordham students took part in 45 meetings, including one attended by New York State Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart Cousins.

This year, Fordham requested an increase of $1.4 million for student aid and academic pipeline programs. For Fordham CSTEP, this would increase state funding to $17.3 million; for STEP, which serves junior high and high school students, it would increase state funding to $22.8 million. Fordham is currently home to 300 CSTEP students enrolled at Rose Hill, and 590 STEP students are enrolled at both the Rose Hill and Lincoln Center campuses.

The request also includes funding for the Higher Education Opportunity Program (HEOP), the Liberty Partnership Program (LLP), Direct Institutional Aid (Bundy Aid), and the Enhancing Supports and Services for Students with Disabilities for Postsecondary Success Program (SWDPS). Students and staff from HEOP and LLP also participated in the meetings. There are 394 HEOP students attending the Lincoln Center and Rose Hill Campus programs.

Massiah-Arthur said students are a crucial part of the funding process.

“When students are involved, there’s an entirely new energy that goes into the advocacy process. It’s one thing for me or the program director to talk about the importance of these programs. It’s another thing when students and parents participate, and elected officials can hear firsthand the importance of state funding,” she said.

In years past, they’ve had to make a case against cuts to STEP and CSTEP, which receive 40% of their funding from Fordham, but Massiah-Arthur said the good news is that lawmakers now understand the value of programs such as CSTEP, so they’re no longer routinely put on the chopping block. The decision on funding levels will be revealed in the final state budget in April.

“The objective now is to get legislators and the governor’s office to understand that it’s not just sufficient to hold the level, because with rising costs, staying at the same level is the equivalent of a cut,” she said.

“Unfortunately, what has not changed is the perception that private universities are institutions with wealthier students or higher endowments, and as a result of that, the need to invest in our sector is not weighed as important as investments in the state and city university systems.”

Promoting Civic Engagement

Advocacy Day is more than just an annual exercise in asking for financial support, said Fordham CSTEP and STEP director Michael Molina. It introduces students to a broader effort involving the Association of Professional Administrators of CSTEP and STEP (which Molina serves as president), and the New York Student Aid Alliance. It also promotes civic engagement, preparing students to become leaders in their communities.

“When we ask our students and their families to participate in these advocacy efforts, a big part of what we say is, you can make a difference,” he said.

“The last several years have made people feel that government is estranged from them and doesn’t address their needs. What we say is, at this level, these legislators have to be accountable to you, and they are.”

For Isaac Mullings, a second-year student from Ghana on the pre-med track who commutes from the Mount Eden neighborhood in the Bronx, Advocacy Day was a chance to share just how much of a lifeline CSTEP has been to his whole family. When both of his parents were laid off from their jobs as home health aides last year, he took a job at a local fast-food restaurant and juggled a 35-hour workweek and 16 credits of remote-learning classes. He now works in the CSTEP office, where like Rosario, he finds a wealth of resources to support his studies. He also tutors high school students enrolled in STEP.

“It’s been a blessing to give back to the community,” he said.

Giovanni Owens, a second-year student who commutes from Spanish Harlem, said that working with STEP students for his work-study program has increased his knowledge in his own major, computer science. This past summer, he served as an adviser for a STEP class on robotics.

“Although it’s for high school students, I find myself learning things through teaching them, through tutoring, and then just sitting in class taking notes,” he said.

When it was his turn to talk to legislators, he said he emphasized the strength of Fordham’s CSTEP community and how it will help him become the first person in his family to earn a bachelor’s degree.

“In the CSTEP office, I talk very openly about my intended entrepreneurial projects and things I want to do, and just having people there who will listen and say, ‘That’s a great idea,’ or ‘You should talk to this professor, or you should talk to this person,’ is amazing.”

The grant, which is administered by the Dormitory Authority of the State of New York, was the result of bi-partisan support of the State’s assembly and senate. Lesley A. Massiah-Arthur, associate vice president of government relations and urban affairs at Fordham, explained that the University secured the support of legislative leadership, including former New York senators Jeffrey Klein and Martin Golden, as well as the Assembly’s Bronx delegation, which is led by Assemblyman Jeffrey Dinowitz.

After Klein and Golden were defeated in elections in 2018, Government Relations worked with the staffs of New York State Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie, former State Senate Majority Leader John Flanagan, current State Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins and Governor Andrew Cuomo to move the project through the legislative and agency processes toward completion.

Massiah-Arthur said the grant, which will reimburse Fordham for recently completed work to refurbish facilities on the Rose Hill campus, is proof that New York lawmakers see Fordham as a an institution that serves the public at large.

“While this project represents Fordham’s vision to provide its students and faculty with the resources they need for cutting-edge scientific discovery,” she said, “ultimately, the pursuit of this grant is representative of the University’s commitment to creating a vibrant science community at Fordham and within the region,” she said.

The University has worked in tandem with government before, securing public funds for the construction of new residence halls at Rose Hill, as well as its regional parking facility.

Massiah-Arthur said that when it comes to the sciences, Fordham can point to programs such as STEP (Science and Technology Entry Program for Students in Grades 7 to 12) and CSTEP (Collegiate Science and Technology Entry Program) as examples of the University reaching beyond the campus. STEP is an enrichment program for underrepresented minority and economically disadvantaged students in junior high and high school, while CSTEP is a statewide undergraduate scholars program designed to prepare minority and economically disadvantaged students for careers in the STEM, health and law fields.  Government Relations also secured the support of its legislative delegations to successfully restore the proposed budget cuts to these programs.

The renovation of the third floor of John Mulcahy Hall was motivated by a dramatic growth in the STEM field at Fordham. Over the past decade, undergraduate enrollment in STEM has more than doubled, and graduate enrollment in STEM has septupled.

“At the end of the day, this shows not only that private colleges and universities contribute to the public good, but that we’ve worked hard at building our relationship with our legislators, staff, and the agencies,” Massiah-Arthur said.

The forum will be held:
Monday, July 31
6-7:30 p.m.
12th Floor Lounge, Lowenstein Center
Lincoln Center campus

It will feature District 6 incumbent Helen Rosenthal (D) and fellow candidates Cary Goodman, David Owens, William Raudenbush, and Mel Wymore, to discuss important preservation, land use, and development issues.

The forum, “The Balance Between Land Use and Quality of Life,” is being co-hosted by LANDMARK WEST!, Historic Districts Council, The League of Preservation Voters, and Fordham. The forum will be moderated by Lesley A. Massiah-Arthur, associate vice president for Government Relations at Fordham.

Massiah-Arthur said she hoped the forum would be an outlet for debate about how a neighborhood can grow in a constructive fashion. In the 6th District, issues such as school integration and a proposed expansion of the Museum of Natural History are high on the agenda.

“Fordham is very much a part of the community and has a vested interest in how the political dynamics are shaped in this area, but by the same token, as a not-for-profit institution, we’re not in a position to support one candidate over another,” she said.

“The University is the best setting for these kinds of conversations. It allows us to reflect in a very communal way, and hopefully keeps conversations above board. The fact that people think that Fordham has a level of gravitas in this community is a good thing.”

Christina Greer, Ph.D., associate professor of political science, said the race, which will effectively be decided when primary elections are held on Sept. 12, is expected to be a replay of the 2013 election, when Rosenthal won with 27 percent of the vote and Wymore got 21 percent. On July 27, Greer is moderating a separate debate between several candidates in the district on the Manhattan Neighborhood Network.

“[Rosenthal] has somewhat of an incumbency advantage, but because [Wymore] was able to garner a pretty good amount of support back then, I think he’s been working pretty tirelessly with various groups over the past four years,” she said.

Greer called Wymore a “bit of a thorn in [Rosenthal’s] side.”

“He was always pretty clear, when he lost, that he’d be running again.”

Monday’s event is free to the public, but reservations are required.

]]> 75235 https://now.fordham.edu/university-news/fordham-joins-citywide-effort-to-beat-the-heat/ Thu, 15 Jun 2017 19:20:00 +0000 http://news.fordham.sitecare.pro/?p=70284 Cool Neighborhoods NYC, a $106 million initiative to mitigate the threat to public health from extreme heat, officially kicked off on June 14 at the Rose Hill campus.

The gathering, held on the roof of O’Hare Hall, brought together representatives from government, the private sector, and nonprofit organizations on what was, coincidentally, the first day following a three-day heat wave in the city.

Daniel Zarrilli, chief resilience officer and senior director of climate policy and programs for the City of New York, said that 2016 marked the third straight year of record heat in the United States, a consequence of global warming. In New York, one of the consequences of that will be a tripling of the number of 90-degree days between now and 2050. As such, the city is committed to an 80 percent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by then.

“It’s not just heat, though. There are impacts from sea-level rising, increases in storm surges, increases in rain. All of this will impact New York City, and we need to be prepared for that,” he said.

The Cool Neighborhoods initiative includes plans to plant more trees in the South Bronx, Upper Manhattan, and Central Brooklyn. More outreach efforts to caregivers of the elderly— particularly in neighborhoods with less air conditioning— are also planned.

Over the summer months, Fordham will participate in an initiative to make six buildings—O’Hare Hall, Tierney Hall, Martyrs’ Court, McGinley Center, Queens Court, and Walsh Hall— part of the city-wide °CoolRoofs program. At Rose Hill, approximately 82,000 square feet of roof surface will be treated with a specialized coating material that is lightly colored and has high solar reflectivity and high infrared emissivity. A cool roof reduces the amount of energy absorbed by the roof, which helps lower a building’s temperature and cuts energy costs.

The program, a partnership between the New York City Department of Small Business Services, the Mayor’s Office of Sustainability, the Mayor’s Office of Recovery and Resiliency, and Sustainable South Bronx, was launched in 2009. It has coated more than 6.7 million square feet of rooftop across all five boroughs, contributing to lower cooling costs and reducing an estimated 2,680 metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2) emissions in the city.

The installations are provided by the city at no-cost to non-profit organizations.

Jennifer Mitchell, executive director of Sustainable South Bronx, said °CoolRoofs, which currently employs 70 people, has been wildly successful because it pairs environmental work with job training.

“We are now able to run a program that is helping the environment while at the same time putting people back to work, putting money in their pockets, allowing them to provide for their families, and allowing them to be productive, contributing members of society,” she said.

Lesley A. Massiah-Arthur, Fordham’s associate vice president for Government Relations and Urban Affairs, said that 10 years ago, Fordham joined the NYC Carbon Challenge and pledged to reduce its building-based emissions by 30 percent or more over the course of 10 years. While the University has made great strides in the area, there is much more work to be done, she said.

“With all the ills of the world that call for repair and redress, combatting climate change may well be the great work of our time. It is, as [Fordham President] Father McShane would say, holy work, taken up on behalf of other people separated from us by time and distance—people who we’ll never know, but whose very lives depend on actions we take today, here and now,” she said.

In light of the recent announcement by President Trump that the United States will withdraw from the Paris Climate Accord, Massiah-Arthur said Fordham’s participation in the °CoolRoofs program is meant to both reduce the University’s greenhouse gas emissions and signal to others to resist apathy and despair.

“By our example, we show that people of good conscious and good will can affect the necessary changes before it is too late,” she said.