Happy 70th Birthday, Queens College

Seventy years ago 400 students walked onto a campus that was still a-building and matriculated at a new institution. Today, more than 18,000 students are enrolled at Queens College, long considered to be a jewel in the crown of the City University of New York (CUNY)- an institution founded some 24 years after Queens College first opened its doors.

Queens College at first charged no tuition; today students pay several thousand dollars a year to attend. As is the case with other city and state colleges, however, tuition is considerably lower than at comparable private institutions- and the education offered at Queens College is now, as it has always been, the equal of, and in many cases, far superior to, that of private, pricier, schools.

The founders of Queens College provided its students a campus that equaled many a private institution aesthetically as well. The original buildings and those that were constructed later all convey the same message: the students attending Queens College are the equal of those at any college or university and deserve a campus that shows the high regard in which they are held.

The student body- commuter students from the borough and throughout the city- also compares favorably with the classes attending private institutions. The Queens College Class of 1941 graduated just in time to enlist in the United States armed forces and fight in Word War II. More women than men were students during the war years, a situation that reversed after the war, when returning soldiers took advantage of the G.I. Bill to further their education. But while tuition was once free and today students pay far less than they would at a private college or university, Queens College requires its students to meet high academic standards to enter and remain enrolled.

In the 70 years of its existence, the college has seen students take sides for and against other policies and conflicts concerning the United States and its place in the world. Queens College student Andrew Goodman, along with fellow civil rights workers James Chaney and Michael Schwerner, was murdered in Mississippi in 1964. The Flushing campus has never tried to isolate itself from the surrounding borough or the rest of the city, the nation and the world and, unlike some other institutions, has maintained a policy of airing all points of view.

Anyone who meets the entrance requirements can attend Queens College, and once having availed him- or herself of the accumulated wisdom of the ages conveyed by some of the most outstanding minds in their respective fields, is free to rise as high as he or she desires to go. Congratulations to Queens College on 70 years of embodying the highest ideals of American education and promulgating the American dream. Here's to 70 more such glorious years and many more to come.