October 14th, 2010 
Brenne Meirowitz 
The following information is for students who may be attending online accredited homeschool programs at SUNY Albany, or considering application. Today, a friend posted an article from the NY Times Opinionator Blog on her FaceBook profile entitled, “The Crisis of the Humanities Officially Arrives,” by Stanley Fish. As Mr. Fish rightly points out – this has been a long time in the making. The article was in response to a reader’s comment on the week’s previous article about Allen Ginsburg regarding higher learning. On October 11, 2010 Fish wrote:
“What he didn’t know at the time is that it had already happened, on Oct. 1, when George M. Philip, president of SUNY Albany, announced that the French, Italian, classics, Russian and theater programs were getting the axe.”
Needless to say, a lot of FaceBook pontificating followed her post, including my own, but did not at the time reflect changes to SUNYs online homeschool programs. None the less, as a habit, I always make sure to go to the source first before reaching conclusions based on newspaper articles – especially those in the Opinion section. The school website specifically states that it is NOT cutting the arts and humanities – only downsizing after losing nearly $12 million in State assistance. Further, over the past three years, the University has cumulatively lost more than $33.5 million in State funding cuts, which is more than 30 percent down from prior years. Here is a direct quote from the SUNY Albany website:
