Hostos Community College

Hostos community college is a public institution in the Bronx, New York State. As the name suggests, Hostos is a community college, and a community college is not the same as a University. The main difference between a University and a community college is that in a community college, it takes two years to complete most of the degrees offered in the community college. In comparison, it takes four years to complete a degree program offered by the university. Community colleges have good quality academic programs suitable for preparing students for a future career or future transfer to a university. Starting a community college can give an individual a chance to save money since community colleges are not expensive compared to the four-year university, and the community college can give individuals a boost in their academic careers. Hostos community college is not exceptional as it provides two years degree programs and is an excellent start for an individual academic career. Hostos community college was started on April 22, 1968, through an act by the Board of Higher Education. The Hostos community college was created as a response to the demands of Puerto Rican and other Hispanic leaders. They demanded and incredibly pressured the Board of Higher Education to start a college to meet the academic needs of the people of South Bronx in New York State. After about two years, in 1970, Hostos community college admitted its first batch of students.

The college started well since it enrolled six hundred and twenty-three students for its first class. The students’ first enrollment was done at a site that was formerly a tire factory located at 475 Grand Concourse (Hostos CC Course Catalog, 2022). In four years, the enrollment for Hostos community college had significantly grown, and the college had more than two thousand students by June 1974. With the rapid increase in the number of students enrolling at the Hostos community college, the former tire factory space was becoming more and smaller for the large number of students enrolled at the college. To solve the excellent problem that Hostos community college was facing at the time, the state legislature, in response to the problem, passed a bill on acquiring the “500 building,” which is located opposite the former tire factory now the Hostos community college. The passing of the bill by the State legislature to acquire the “500 building” was to ease the space shortage that the Hostos community college was facing since the college’s number of students was rising. Hostos community college was highly favored since in the same year that is in 1974 when it was facing space shortage, and the state legislature passed a bill on acquiring new space for the college, it was given full and unconditional accreditation after a very successful assessment by the Middle States Association (Hostos CC Course Catalog, 2022).

In the mid-1970s, an economic crisis in the United States of America resulted in the thoughts of merging Hostos community college with other established institutions to cut costs and save the college. The idea aimed to caution the Hostos community college from the effects of the mid-1970s crisis. These efforts to merge Hostos with another institution were futile, and the merger did not succeed. The established institutions opposed the merger, and the community opposed the idea of merging the Hostos community college with another vital institution. Hostos community college needed to be protected since there was too much opposition to its merger, and if the college was not protected, then it meant that the college would collapse and be closed due to the mid-1970s economic crisis in the United States of America. The States legislature had to act to protect the Hostos community college. The States legislature was forced to include a guarantee of Hostos community college’s existence in the Landes Act of Higher Education. The guarantee act was passed on June 9, 1976. Due to the rising number of enrollments, Hostos today has six buildings, and out of the six, three are designed to meet the needs of the institutions (Hostos CC Course Catalog, 2022).

Hostos community college is the first institution of higher learning on the mainland to be named after a Puerto Rican, Eugenio Maria de Hostos. Eugenio Hostos was an educator, writer, and patriot. In the Hostos community college, a large population of the students, approximately sixty percent, are Hispanic; therefore, most of the programs offered in Hostos community college are taught in Spanish though the college also provides extensive English language and ESL instructions to the students in the community college. The Hostos community college has significantly grown and has a Hostos Center for Arts and Culture. This is a performing art center which is located within the college campus. The Hostos Center for Arts and Culture consists of a museum-like art gallery, a 367 repertory seat theater, and 900 seats at the main theater. The Hostos Center for Arts and Culture has been a showcasing theater of different dances and music for different artists for the last thirty-three years. The Hostos Center for Arts and Culture was built in the late 1980s to make Hostos a community college to be a cultural force in the Bronx and all over New York City. Today, the Hostos Center for Arts and culture within the community college has genuinely been a cultural force within the Bronx and all over New York City since some renowned artists have performed in the Hostos Center for Arts and Culture. On May 20, 2011, Hostos community college was in the newspaper for its tremendous achievements and growth. The Hostos community college opened a 1.05 million dollar state-of-the-art recording studio to serve students interested in the digital media career (New York Post, 2011). The facility, approved by the City University of New York, will expand the media programs such as media production, digital design, and animation at Hostos community college.

After three decades since the Hostos community college was established, 50.3 percent of the full-time faculty holds a doctorate, while 45.5 percent hold a master’s degree. Although most students at the Hostos community college are Hispanic, the general population of the college is diverse. Nearly all the cultures surrounding Hostos community college are represented (Hostos CC Course Catalog, 2022). Diversity has been instrumental at Hostos community college, as it takes pride in being one of the most diverse institutions of higher learning in New York State. The Hostos community college is one of the seven community colleges in the City University of New York. The City University of New York is one of the nation’s leading urban public universities that serve more than half a million students in its twenty-five different colleges.

Academically, Hostos community college has advanced since it is offering twenty-eight associate degrees and two certificates (Hostos community college, 2022). In addition, Hostos community college is the only community college of the City University of New York offering a degree in Game Design program. Successful completion of most of the degrees offered in Hostos community college allows the students to easily transfer from the Hostos community college to one of the many City University of New York’s four-year institutions or any other four-year institution. During the establishment of Hostos community college, the programs offered were not as many as it has now since the college has been on increasing growth which includes even growth of programs offered at the college. The college also allows dual degree programs where the eligible students graduate with either an Associate in Arts degree or an Associate in Science degree while meeting all the requirements in the student’s area of study, allowing smooth transfer to a four-year university (State University.com, 2022). When Hostos community college was established, it offered physical learning only. There is tremendous growth at the Hostos community college today, and the college offers both physical and online classes smoothly without facing significant challenges. For the last decade, online learning has been expanding, and the Office of Educational Technology provides all the expansion, development, instructional design, and support. In December 2009, the college started implementing hybrid courses, which are partly taught online and partly in class. The hybrid courses started in the fall of 2010. The Office of Academic Affairs invited a team of members from all the participating City University of New York campuses to enable sharing of resources and coming up with the best practices. In 2013 Hostos community college began its asynchronous initiative to ensure and encourage the faculty to develop and teach asynchronous online courses based on hybrid courses (Hostos community college, 2022). In the spring of 2018, many significant steps were made toward improving all online course development and delivery areas. There was an addition of an online learning coordinator. The work of the online learning coordinator is to oversee the instructional designers’ developments, ideas, and contributions. Today, the Hostos community college has very many courses that they offer online over the internet. The courses have been developed and polished such that expert instructors teach the courses. The online courses offered by Hostos community college are affordable, fast, convenient, and fun. Online learning did not replace physical learning at Hostos community college, as the college offers both online and physical learning. Online learning is very convenient to so many individuals interested in learning from the comfort of their homes. The Hostos community college offers more than three hundred courses online (Hostos Community college, 2022), making the college reach so many individuals within the United States territories and outside the borders of the United States of America.

In March 2004, the Hostos community college founded a foundation that is a not-for-profit corporation with the sole purpose of supporting the Eugenio Maria de Hostos community through charitable projects. For the college to start a foundation to help the Hostos community implies that the Hostos community college has grown over the years and saw it wise to give back to the community through a charitable foundation. The Hostos community college foundation encourages charitable support through gifts, scholarships to needy students in the Hostos community, subsidies, grants, and other funds aimed at helping the people of the Hostos community (Hostos community college, 2022). The board members that direct and manage the foundation’s operations actively promote fundraising activities that are in accordance with the foundation by-laws, and the board of managers makes the relevant recommendations for that involving the acceptance of grants, monies, securities and other donations. The Hostos community college also has an award winning division of continuing education and workforce development. An award which was not there when the college was created in 1968. The award winning division shows how the Hostos community college is dedicated to staff development since the award winning division and workforce development offers professional training programs to Hostos community college staff where they are given a certificate after participating in the professional development training courses. In addition, the college has an alumni relations office which was founded back in 2003. The alumni relations office is giving thousands of Hostos community college alumni students a platform to interact and also check on the welfare of alumni students. The alumni relations office encourages all the alumni students of Hostos community college to say in touch with the college and be part of the vast professional network of Hostos community college. The Hostos community college has come up with an alumni identification card that helps the alumni students to continue enjoying the benefits of the college even after they have graduated. For example, an alumni student with the alumni identification card can be able to access library services, recreational activities, computer laboratory, cultural events (Hostos community college, 2022) and the networking activities.

Technology advancement has been on the rise in the last one decade, and every field is competing to reap the benefits provided by the different technology advancements which have been realized within the last ten years or more. Hostos community college has not been left behind since it has a very simple to use website which offers all the necessary information an individual needs to know concerning the community college. This is a typical advancement since the Hostos community college website is an interactive website and at the same time, individuals can make their applications online. When the Hostos community college was started it did not have such a website, but today the college has grown, and it has one of the best websites based on its simplicity to use and adequate information provided in the website. The website even provides a virtual tour of the Hostos community college.

In conclusion, Hostos community college has grown over the years and the college is still going to grow and even become bigger. It is just a matter of time and the college will be like the City University of New York.

References

Hostos CC Course Catalog. (2022). History of Hostos community college | Hostos CC catalog. https://hostos.catalog.cuny.edu/intro/history

Hostos Community college. (2022). Online courses – Hostos community college. Hostos Community College. https://www.hostos.cuny.edu/Division-of-Continuing-Education- Workforce-Develop/Continuing-Education-Workforce-Development/General- Info/Online-Courses

Hostos community college. (2022). Mission and history. Hostos Social Network – A Learning Community. https://commons.hostos.cuny.edu/online/mission-and-history/

Hostos community college. (2022, March 29). Member benefits – Hostos community college. Make a Gift – Hostos Community College. https://hostos.thankyou4caring.org/member- benefits.

Hostos community college. (2022, May 25). Hostos CC Foundation – Hostos community college. Make a Gift – Hostos Community College. https://hostos.thankyou4caring.org/hostos-cc- foundation

Hostos community college. (2022). About Hostos – Hostos community college. Hostos Community College. https://www.hostos.cuny.edu/About-Hostos

New York Post. (2011, May 20). Hostos community college opens $1.05 million recording studio. https://nypost.com/2011/05/20/hostos-community-college-opens-1-05-million- recording-studio/

State University.com. (2022). CUNY Hostos community college (CUNYHCC, Hostos CC) history and academics – Bronx, NY. USA University College Directory – U.S. University Directory – State Universities and College Rankings. https://www.stateuniversity.com/universities/NY/City_University_of_New_Y ork_Hostos_Community_College.html