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Nanette Shaw
Assistant Vice President for Public Affairs
PRESS CONTACT:
David Manning
212. 817.7177 or 7170
dmanning@gc.cuny.edu
May 15, 1999
for IMMEDIATE release
GRADUATE CENTER LOOKS FORWARD, GRADUATES LOOK BACK
IN FINAL COMMENCEMENT FROM 42 STREET LOCATION
Emeritus Professor Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., Among Honorary Degree Recipients
Marian McPartland Will Perform
Historian Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr. — a faculty member at the City University Graduate Center for 28 years — will be among those receiving honorary doctorates at the Graduate Center's 35th Commencement on Friday, May 28 at Town Hall, 123 West 43 Street. This year will mark the school's final commencement while located on 42 Street; by next fall, the Graduate Center will be in its new campus at 365 Fifth Avenue. The ceremony will get underway at 10:45 a.m. with a cap-and-gown procession along 43 Street from the Graduate Center to Town Hall. The program will begin at 11 a.m., and 277 doctorates and 43 master's degrees will be awarded. Graduate Center President Frances Degen Horowitz will deliver the commencement address, and honorary doctorates will also be presented to jazz pianist Marian McPartland — who will perform — Gerald Schoenfeld, Chairman of the Board of the Shubert Organization, and David R. Jones, Esq, President and CEO of the Community Service Society.
The Graduate School and University Center is the doctorate-granting institution of the largest urban university in the U.S. The only consortium of its kind in the nation, the school draws its faculty of more than 1,700 members mainly from the CUNY senior colleges and cultural and scientific institutions throughout New York City.
Established in 1961, the Graduate Center has grown to an enrollment of nearly 4,000 students in 31 doctoral programs and seven master's degree programs in the humanities, social sciences, and sciences. The Graduate Center also houses 23 research centers and institutes and administers the CUNY Baccalaureate Program.
According to a recent National Research Council report, more than a third of the Graduate Center's rated programs rank among the nation's top 20 at public and private institutions, nearly a quarter are among the top ten when compared to publicly supported institutions alone, and more than half are among the top five programs at publicly supported institutions in the northeast.
CUNY Graduate Center Commencement bios
Speaker
Frances Degen Horowitz, a nationally recognized educational leader and renowned developmental psychologist, is President of The Graduate School and University Center of The City University of New York. Dr. Horowitz came to the CUNY Graduate Center in September 1991 from the University of Kansas, Lawrence, where she was Vice Chancellor for Research, Graduate Studies, and Public Service and Dean of the Graduate School. Acclaimed for her research, particularly in infant behavior and development, she is a Fellow of the Division of Developmental Psychology of the American Psychological Association and the author of more than 120 articles, chapters, monographs, and books on the subjects of infant development, early childhood development, high-risk infants, the gifted, and theories of development.
A native New Yorker, Dr. Horowitz received her bachelor's degree from Antioch College, earned a master's degree in elementary education from Goucher College, and in 1959, a Ph.D. in developmental psychology from the University of Iowa. Among her many leadership roles in educational and civic organizations, she is a member of the Board of Directors of the National Association of State Universities and Land Grant Colleges (NASULGC) and is chair of NASULGC's Commission on Human Resources and Social Change; has been an active participant in the Council on Research Policy and Graduate Education, serving as its chair; served as a member of the Commission on Women in Higher Education of the American Council on Education, and is a member of the Board of the American Committee for the Weizmann Institute.
Honorary Degree Recipients
Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr., presently holds the title of Albert Schweitzer Professor of the Humanities Emeritus at the CUNY Graduate Center. One of America's most well-known and influential historians, he has won two Pulitzer Prizes, a Guggenheim Fellowship, and two National Book Awards, and received a 1998 National Humanities Medal, among numerous other honors.
Born in Columbus, Ohio in 1917, Mr. Schlesinger entered Harvard at age 16, majored in history and literature, and graduated summa cum laude in 1938. At age 28, he won his first Pulitzer Prize, for the widely acclaimed work The Age of Jackson. His numerous other influential works on history and politics include: The Age of Roosevelt (three volumes, 1957, 1958, and 1960); The Politics of Upheaval (1960), for which he won the Parkman and Bancroft prizes; A Thousand Days: John F. Kennedy in the White House (for which he received the 1966 Pulitzer Prize for Biography); and Robert F. Kennedy and His Times (1978). Without a Ph.D., he served on the Harvard faculty from 1946 to 1961, was Special Assistant to President Kennedy from 1961-63, and joined the faculty of the City University of New York Graduate Center in 1966.
Gerald Schoenfeld is Chairman of the Board of the Shubert Organization, perhaps the most well-known owner and operator of live-performance theaters in the U.S. The Shubert Organization, which traces its roots back to the turn of the century, has played a key role in the history and development of the American theater, overseeing the production of countless classic plays, musicals, and other dramatic pieces.
Mr. Schoenfeld and his former partner, the late Bernard Jacobs, together gained control of the Shubert Organization several decades ago and are credited with revitalizing the operation. The Shubert Organization has brought to the stage dozens of productions, including such works as Amadeus, An Inspector Calls, The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby, The Most Happy Fella, Children of a Lesser God, The Heidi Chronicles, Little Shop of Horrors, and Cats. In addition to his professional accomplishments, Mr Schoenfeld has played a key role in community development and civic affairs in New York City. He has helped lead the effort to renew and improve Times Square and the surrounding area. Mr. Schoenfeld received a Bachelor of Science degree from the University of Illinois and a law degree from New York University.
Marian McPartland, an award-winning musician, composer, and radio show host, is one of the leading figures in jazz piano today. Her music has been heard in countless concert halls, theater, nightclubs and on the radio, television, and in movies.
Born in England, Ms. McPartland began her studies preparing for a career in classical music. During World War II, she joined ENSA, the English equivalent of the USO, and later transferred to the USO, going to France with the first group after the Normandy invasion. Ms. McPartland opened in New York in 1950 at the Embers Club. Two years later, the Marian McPartland Trio played what was to have been a two-week engagement at the Hickory House on 52 Street but the group was held over for a year. The Hickory House became the home base for Ms. McPartland and her combo into the 1960s. In addition to her numerous recordings and compositions, she is the recipient of many awards, most notably the prestigious Peabody Award, Downbeat's Lifetime Achievement Award, and the ASCAP-Deems Taylor Award, for her National Public Radio show "Piano Jazz," which is celebrating its twentieth season.
David R. Jones, Esq., has been President and CEO of the Community Service Society (CSS) of New York since 1986. One of the nation's oldest and largest nonprofit social welfare organizations, the CSS uses direct help, research, advocacy, and litigation to alleviate the effects of poverty, focusing on the areas of education, healthcare delivery, income security, affordable housing, and volunteerism.
Mr. Jones was born in the Bedford-Stuyvesant section of Brooklyn in 1948. He earned a Bachelor of Arts from Wesleyan University and a law degree from Yale University in 1974. In 1975, he joined the law firm of Cravath, Swaine & Moore, where he specialized in corporate antitrust cases and contract litigation. In 1979, he was appointed Special Advisor to the Mayor of New York City with responsibilities in race relations, urban development, immigration reform, and education. Mr. Jones is credited with advancing the cause of fair consideration of undercounted communities in the 1980 Census and helping Mayor Koch attain his goal of making more representative appointments than any previous mayor of New York.
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