The College of Staten Island was chosen this winter to be a major recipient of funding from New York City’s $20 million CUNY 2x Tech Initiative, which seeks to double the number of career-qualified tech graduates by 2022. Designed and delivered in partnership with industry and academia, the initiative focuses on building the capacity of computer science departments to offer rapidly evolving industry-aligned skills, awareness, and experience to enable students to connect to jobs in the NYC tech ecosystem following graduation. Funding will support new, industry experienced, full- and part-time faculty, advisors, and job coaches.
CSI’s successful application was a result of a collaboration among the Computer Science Department, Academic Affairs, and the Division of Economic Development, Continuing Studies, and Government Relations. Department Chair Shuqun Zhang welcomed the opportunities that CUNY 2x will bring to the students and the department. “We are excited by the opportunity for CUNY 2x to build upon the excellent reputation of CSI’s Computer Science Department, which is already recognized for excellence nationally pursuant to its accreditation by the Computing Accreditation Commission of the Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology. I would like to commend the special efforts of Sarah Zelikovitz, Deborah Sturm, Ken Iwama, and Jasmine Cardona in supporting our successful application.”
Commenting on the initiative, Vice President for Economic Development, Continuing Studies, and Government Relations Ken Iwama also applauded the cooperative effort. “We are honored to have been able to collaborate with the Computer Science Department and Academic Affairs to successfully attain CUNY 2x funding. A core mission of the Division of Economic Development, Continuing Studies, and Government Relations is to connect academic departments to external opportunities to bring added resources and collaborations for our students. We are all ecstatic about this outcome.”
