Stony Brook University Proposed as a SUNY "flagship" institution

STONY BROOK, NY - The importance of the State University of New York (SUNY) establishing "flagship campuses" similar to other prominent state institutions such as Berkeley and UCLA was recognized in the New York Governor's State of the State Address issued on January 9, 2008. It was cited that Stony Brook and University of Buffalo are the campuses that would be ideal well equipped for that distinction.

President Kenny highlighted the importance of increasing funding to research institutions to match other leading state universities such as Berkeley, Ann Arbor, and Austin. She believes it will help New York advance to greater economic development, medical breakthroughs, and energy solutions.

The Governor called for funding to support "cutting-edge" research at both public and private universities and bringing together Stony Brook, world renowned Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, and Brookhaven National Laboratory. The alliance was recognized as being important because it would form a "peerless cross-disciplinary research engine" and have great economic benefit to Long Island.

Other proposals on Higher Education were also made, including investing in community colleges, simplifying the transfer process between community college students to four-year SUNY and City University of New York (CUNY) colleges, and creating a permanent $4 billion higher education endowment fund.

In the New York budget proposal for the 2008-2009 fiscal year, released on January 22, a three percent increase in the budget for higher education was suggested as compared to 2007-2008. A Higher Education Endowment Fund is proposed, which will serve as a permanent source of funding for New York 's colleges and universities, to be financed by the New York State Lottery system. With the budget, there also begins a new, five-year, $9.3 billion capital plan for SUNY and CUNY that will help build a world-class infrastructure for the higher education system in New York .