CUNY BA Program

• What is the CUNY Baccalaureate (BA) Program?
  • Overview & Goals
  • Academic Standards
  • Faculty Mentors
  • Admission Criteria
  • Degree Requirements
  • Areas of Concentration
  • Academic Regulations
  • Contact
    

The CUNY Baccalaureate (BA) Program.
Overview & Goals

The CUNY Baccalaureate Program is a unique and exciting program that allows you to earn a Bachelor of Arts or Science degree from the City University of New York. It is your chance to design your own curriculum that is tailored to your academic, professional and personal interests. In addition, the program has the special advantage of allowing you to take courses at any combination of the University's seventeen undergraduate colleges, the Graduate School, The School of Professional Studies, and On-line courses. You are encouraged to include independant studies, internships, tutorials, honors courses, graduate level courses and study abroad for your degree.

The CUNY BA student is a highly motivated and responsible student with the vision and drive to design their own degree.  There is virtually no limit to the possiblities open to the CUNY BA student.

Students in the program have created and completed such specializations as: Disability Studies, Cross-Cultural Psychology, Conservation Biology, Environmental Chemistry, Artistic Traditions in Religion, International Economic Relations, Culinary Journalism, Food in a Cultural Context, Afro-Caribbean Urban Studies, Management and Sociology, Black Culture and Religion, Behavioral Science and Community Health, Law of International Trade and Commerce, Applied Interactive Multimedia Studies, Entrepreneurship, and Geriatric Health Issues.

Alumni of the program have been accepted to graduate programs and professional schools across the country.

The CUNY Baccalaureate staff looks forward to working with you.

The CUNY Baccalaureate Program has three goals:

1. To encourage students to avail themselves of the extraordinary resources and learning opportunities available at the City University's seventeen undergraduate colleges and at the Graduate School
2. To allow self-directed, academically able students to design, with faculty guidance, an undergraduate area of specialization that complements their unique academic, professional, and personal goals
3. To foster intellectual explorations and responsible educational innovation by permitting students to use a variety of learning strategies.

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Academic Standards

The CUNY Baccalaureate Program maintains high academic standards. To be eligible for admission, students must become matriculated at a CUNY college, have passed all the CUNY skills assessment tests, and have earned at least 15 credits with a minimum grade point average of 2.50 overall and on recent work. Once admitted, students are required to maintain a 2.50 average overall and in their area(s) of concentration.

Students take a minimum of 60 credits in the liberal arts and sciences for the BS, 90 for the BA; within those credits, they satisfy a 13-course core distribution requirement that includes a year of foreign language. All courses for the distribution must be taken for letter grades.

At least 75 percent of the credits for the CUNY degree must be earned in regular course work, and half of any area of concentration must be completed in CUNY as a CUNY Baccalaureate student. All credits for an area of concentration must be approved by a CUNY faculty member mentor and taken for letter grades at senior colleges that offer the appropriate bachelor's degree.

Students may earn up to 30 credits for non-classroom work such as credit by examination. Up to 15 of the 30 non-classroom credits may be awarded for prior experiential learning based on faculty evaluation of a portfolio documenting what the student has learned. About 16 percent of CUNY Baccalaureate students earn some credit in this way.

The City University of New York awards the CUNY BA and BS degrees, and the program is accredited by the Middle States Association of Colleges and Schools and by the New York State Education Department

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Faculty Mentors

The Programs Mission is to foster intelectual exploration and responisble innovation. The degree's heart is the learning partnership between you and a faculty mentor. Faculty mentors assume the key academic responsibility of ensuring that their student's area of concentration will prepare him or her for graduate work in the same field. Students must have a mentor with the expertise in each area of concentration they choose. With the mentor's guidance, the student selects the courses to be taken for the area. These courses must be interrelated, be at the intermediate or advanced level (i.e., they normally have at least one prerequisite in the same discipline), and must be taken for a letter grade at a senior college offering the appropriate bachelor's degree. There must be at least eight such courses for a single area, six for a dual area, more if the mentor knows that more are needed.

The rule of thumb is simple: if the selected courses will not provide the student with the background and preparation needed for admission to a master's program, the area of concentration is not adequate or academically valid. The large percentage of program alumni accepted into graduate programs shows that this responsibility is understood and conscientiously fulfilled.

To be eligible to serve as mentors, faculty must have professorial rank or be lecturers with a full-time teaching position with in the City University. Currently 500 CUNY faculty are contributing their time and expertise to mentoring CUNY Baccalaureate students; most are Full or Associate Professors.

The relationship of mentors and students varies as greatly as the individuals involved. Factors that shape the relationship include a student's needs and strengths, the level of independence with witch faculty mentors and students are comfortable, a student's preferred learning style, a mentor's supervisory style, and the amount of time a mentor can spare for this voluntary service.

The ideal mentor ensures that the student's area of concentration is academically sound, monitors the student's academic progress, and takes the trouble to call the Academic Director of the program with any questions or concerns.

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Admission Criteria

To be eligible for admission, a student must:

• Become matriculated at a CUNY college
• Have a valid academic reason for applying
• Have completed at least 15 credits (including transfer credits)
• Have a GPA of at least 2.50 overall and on recent work
• Have passed all three CUNY Skills Assessment Tests-unless they were first matriculated at a college before fall 1978.

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Degree Requirements

The CUNY BA/BS staff is responsible for ensuring that students satisfy the program's degree requirements, including completion of the courses approved by the mentor [s] for the area [s] of concentration. Individual requirements are listed in the degree contract each student receives and signs upon being admitted to the program.

Note: CUNY Baccalaureate students must satisfy all departmental course prerequisites, but they are not bound by major-minor requirements at the colleges they attend nor by core, distribution, or other degree requirements of those colleges.

Classroom credits
At least 90 credits of the 120 minimum required for the degree must be earned in regular course work.

Liberal Arts and Sciences Core Distribution
CUNY BA/BS students must complete at least 60 credits in the liberal arts and sciences (90 for a BA) including the following distribution requirements:

• Two courses in literature
• one can be in a language other than English
• Three courses in humanities exclusive of the required literature courses and in subjects other than the area(s) of concentration, chosen from at least two different disciplines
• Three courses in social sciences in subjects other that the area(s) of concentration, chosen from at least two different disciplines
• Completion at level 2 of a language other than English.

• students who successfully completed three years of language and passed the third year Regents exam in high school;
• students, including those whose native language is not English, who demonstrate equivalent proficiency by examination through an approved language program or a college language department
• students who attended high school in another country where the instruction was not in English.

Note: The program's definition of liberal arts and sciences, which is in the CUNY Baccalaureate Program catalog, prevails over local definition. Nonclassroom credits and courses graded Pass are not accepted for the core distribution.

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Area(s) of Concentration

An area of concentration consists -- above and beyond introductory level and prerequisite courses -- of a minimum of eight courses (24 credits) of intermediate and advanced level course work approved by a faculty mentor in the appropriate discipline(s) and taken for letter grades at a senior college offering a bachelor's degree in the appropriate field. Students choosing two areas of concentration take at least six courses (18 credits) in each area. Half of the credits for any area must be completed in CUNY as CUNY Baccalaureate students.

Any CUNY BA/BS student wishing to pursue a business concentration at Baruch College must meet all course prerequisites required of Baruch BBA degree students.

Lower - Division Credits
No more than 60 community college credits are accepted toward a CUNY BA/BS degree.

GPA
Students must maintain a 2.50 GPA overall and a 2.50 average in their area(s) of concentration for all course work done in CUNY.

Residency
There is a 30-credit residency requirement; up to 15 credits earned for independent study, projects of fieldwork may be counted toward this requirement, but not credits earned for prior experimental learning or credits by examination.

Home College
In addition to being a part of the CUNY Baccalaureate program, each CUNY Baccalaureate student must be matriculated at one of the CUNY colleges. This is the student's home college where he or she pays all tuition and fees, takes the university assessment tests in reading, writing and mathematics, and handles all nonacademic matters, such as financial aid and obtaining a college ID card. A community college may be the home college until a student has earned an associate's degree or accumulated 60 credits, whichever comes first. At that point, the student must officially transfer to a senior college, which becomes the new home college.

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Academic Regulations

Non-classroom Credits
Students may earn up to 30 credits for non-classroom work such as NPONSI (National Program on Non-collegiate Sponsored Instruction, administered by The University of the State of New York) and credit by examination. Up to 15 of the 30 non-classroom credits may be awarded for prior experiential learning. Credit by examination, NOPONS credit, and Prior experiential Learning credits do not count toward the Program's 30-credit residency requirement.

Graduate Courses for Undergraduate Credit
With the approval of the appropriate graduate department and of the program's Academic Director, students may take one or two courses at the graduate level for undergraduate credit. Approval is given only to students who have no grades outstanding and who consistently do high quality work.

Pass/Fail Option
Students may take up to 12 credits on a Pass/Fail basis, provided that the course is not part of the distribution requirement or of an area of concentration and that, the department giving the course offers this option.

Maximum Credit Load/Credit Limits
Students may register for a maximum of 18 credits per semester (12 credits in the summer) unless they get prior written permission from the Academic Director to take additional credits. Approval is given only to students who have no grades outstanding and who consistently do high quality work. No more than 45 credits in any one area are accepted toward the degree.

Remedial and English-as-a-Second Language (ESL) Credits
No credits earned in remedial or ESL courses are counted toward the degree, though such courses do appear on the student's transcript if they were taken in CUNY.

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Contact

For more information, please contact:
Campus Coordinator
Debra Bick
Center For Advisement and Orientation
55 Lexington Ave (1 Bernard Baruch Way)
New York, NY 10010
(646) 312-4270
E-mail: Debra_Bickl@baruch.cuny.edu

You can also see the official CUNY Baccalaureate Program Web Site at: http://www.cunyba.cuny.edu/.

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