McNally Jackson Hosts Talk On NYU: Is It A University, Or Just A Corporation?
By Jason Lester
“They shook my bed! They woke me up! Now I’m a tiger!” went the disgruntled cry of one of many long-time Greenwich Village residents in an attendance at Wednesday night’s “News from Underground” talk, hosted by NYU professor Mark Crispin Miller and held at independent bookseller McNally Jackson. The topic this week? “Is It a University, or Just a Corporation? The Case of NYU’s Expansion Plan.” On the panel for the event along with Miller were writers Andrew Ross (a fellow NYU professor and author of Bird on Fire), Tom Angotti (New York for Sale), and Sharon Zukin (Naked City).
Miller opened the discussion with a grave statement on the potential of NYU 2031, the school’s daunting expansion plan to add 2.45 million square feet of space to its “campus”, to “actually bring down the university, financially and academically”. Miller spoke of the conglomerate of faculty voices who have organized a group called NYU Faculty Against the Sexton Plan in opposition to NYU 2031, revealing that 2/3 of the involved faculty members are participating anonymously.
This atmosphere of paranoia and tension has both kept more teachers from speaking out against the expansion, and allowed president John Sexton to deny any faculty resistance against the university. Less obscured has been the community response to the school’s agenda, and during the Q+A portion of the evening, angry Village resident after angry Village resident spoke out against future harm to the neighborhood, as well as damage already wrought.
Zukin invoked NYU’s work with iconic urban planner Robert Moses in the 1950s to demolish loft spaces in order to make way for faculty housing, as well as their efforts in the 1970s to develop manufacturing and industrial spaces into student dormitories. Present throughout the course of the night was her anger at the commoditization “of the last bits of history in the area”, and the way that development has turned streets like University Place into “elongated food courts” perused by a student population with a constant “need for diversion.” Perhaps this portrayal of the undergraduate student body is unfair, but it speaks to the sense of loss and betrayal felt by the longer-term inhabitants of the area we call our campus. Why, in the face of such strong community opposition, has NYU failed to concede any part of their plan?
Professor Andrew Ross positioned the conflict in the midst of more expansive debates over the ways in which urban renewal has given way to new development paradigms, most specifically those of the creative city and “meds and eds” (the latter applying to New York’s model). In this blueprint, chambers of commerce look to universities to bring wealth and prestige to their downtown areas. A typical city aspires to bring about development in the FIRE sector (Finance/Insurance/Real Estate); what the “meds and eds” model does is add an ICE sector (see what they did there?), emphasizing the intellectual, cultural, and educational sectors.
According to Ross, this ICE model was spoken highly of by none other than John Sexton a few years back in reference to university development plans. At a major research university like NYU, the FIRE and ICE sectors are inextricably bound, and a plan like NYU 2031 looks to accomplish progress not only in academic realms, but also in the realm of real estate development.
New York University is one of the top landowners in New York City, so it should come as a surprise to no one that the school is strongly tied to clients and contractors in the urban area. According to Ross, at the “very least”, one can call NYU “a non-profit institution that generates a lot of private profits” (emphasis on the “very least”). Some former students have gone as far as to call NYU a “real estate company that also issues degrees.” Ross finished by citing social critic C. Wright Mills’ analysis of the tri-partate makeup of elite power structures (military, corporate, political), calling for the addition of the urban research university as a “new nucleus in the [structure], devoted to forgetting inclusion and accountability.”
Tom Angotti wrapped up the discussion with an exploration of the possible effects of NYU 2031 on the academic character of the school, warning of administrators who are “hired for their capability to run a knowledge factory that can produce fundable research” rather than educators. He spoke to discussions among administrators at the City University of New York regarding how to market the school to prospective students, and thought it might be much the same at NYU. Angotti closed by encouraging a debate about what kind of city it is that we want to live in; one of walled-off enclaves built in small confined clusters, or an open city with free areas not given over to one organization’s monopolization of space.
We came away from the panel with a strong sense of a lack of belief in the power of undergraduates to speak up against the NYU 2031 plan (one of the panelists told a passionate audience member asking about student protest, “This isn’t 1968.”) Ross pointed out that many students are too busy working two or three jobs to pay off student loans to protest, but also identified the link between university expansion and student debt, calling for more transparency on the ways in which keeping students in debt could be favorable to the school’s growth models. Furthermore, Miller added, students on the right could be made aware of issues such as the closing of the Coles Sports Center, and the fact that the temporary gym replacing it is not actually a typical gym, but solely a place for sports teams to practice.
At the end of the talk, attendees cheered and clapped heartily, grateful for another chance to air their grievances in a public forum. One thing is certain: while the battle against NYU 2031 will be long and hard, these opponents aren’t going to go down without a fight.
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