For decades, CUNY has been known as the king of public institutions within the City of New York, home to opportunities for networking and economic prosperity. Attending CUNY Hunter College is the best decision I could have made for my future academic and professional goals because of the circumstances I faced economically. I could not afford to go to a private school long term, so I chose CUNY, and I have yet to regret that decision as Hunter’s academic prowess continues to be felt daily. Great processors and great opportunities that are exclusive to my school like the Groves Fellowship and Public Policy Degree. Columbia or New York University do not have that, nor do they have the sheer diversity of CUNY’s student Pool. Mothers, fathers, Young and old, international, the whole nine yards. And while I show my love for CUNY and my status as a Hawk, CUNY is not perfect. It’s a bureaucracy that is riddled with issues and independence that causes the schools to be unequal and its administration to be questionable. While CUNY allows students to increase their chances of success, the path to get there isn’t too straightforward. We need to be able to advertise how students can effectively put their eggs into the best basket that allows them to flourish. If a student wants to go into Medicine but is unsure about it causing them to end up at a school like Baruch, then the path to medical school becomes harder. Now take this: a student wants to go into law but is currently at Lehman College, a school that doesn’t have a pre-law major or program to my knowledge. You will be going not as competitive compared to the kids in other schools that are spoonfed opportunities. I’m not saying that we need to spoon-feed students’ opportunities, but we should communicate with them better so that they can use everything to their advantage. There needs to be a unionization of all the different paths and opportunities that students can take within the CUNY system to alleviate this issue.  Going back to the issues of bureaucracy, CUNY financial aid offices and offices of advising are awful compared to what other schools may offer. Now this may be an issue because of the number of students there are but in one of the richest cities in the world, this is completely unacceptable. Instead of fixing the financial aid offices and the staff that do not care to help students with their issues, CUNY being made free like it was before 1976 would just gut the issues entirely. Advising is more of an issue as it is split up into majors and general classes. It’s more of the people that is an issue, but hey, that’s what DegreeWorks is for right?

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