Articles on the Settlement between The Cooper Union and Committee to Save Cooper Union Negotiated by NYS Attorney General
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Cooper Union, Committee to Save Cooper Union Agree to Settle LitigationBy THE COOPER UNION, September 01, 2015 The Board of Trustees of The Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art will enter into a consent agreement with the Committee to Save Cooper Union and the Office of the Attorney General of the State of New York, according to court papers to be filed in New York State Supreme Court on Wednesday, September 2. The agreement will end the litigation over the new financial plan adopted by The Cooper Union’s Board of Trustees in 2013 and allow for the continued sliding-scale scholarship model for undergraduate students while providing for continued steps to strengthen the governance of the institution and for evaluating the possibility for a return to a full-tuition scholarship model. The agreement precludes further litigation of the claims asserted in the current lawsuit. |
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A Second Chance for Cooper UnionSeptember 01, 2015 The Committee to Save Cooper Union (CSCU) has been working closely with the New York Attorney General’s Office (OAG) to return Cooper Union to its tuition-free and merit-based mission, ensure the school’s fiscal recovery, and establish better governance structures. The OAG and CSCU challenged the school’s Board of Trustees to rethink its ill-conceived response to the fiscal crisis, reconsider the decision to charge tuition, and accept binding, verifiable changes to how the school is run. |
 Photo: Spencer Platt/Getty Images |
New York Attorney General Crafts Deal to End Litigation at Cooper UnionAfter a year of negotiations with warring parties at the Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art, New York State’s attorney general, Eric T. Schneiderman, is expected on Wednesday to announce that his office has crafted a settlement that would end litigation and create an independent monitor of the college’s management and finances. |
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Could Cooper Union be free again? Deal with New York AG could restore founder’s missionFROM THE ASSOCIATED PRESS IN CRAIN’S NEW YORK BUSINESS, September 02, 2015 New York’s attorney general announced an agreement Wednesday that would end a lawsuit against Cooper Union and create an independent monitor into the financial management of the college known for its architecture, arts and engineering programs. Attorney General Eric Schneiderman said he hopes the deal eventually could lead to the school restoring free tuition.
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New York Reaches Deal With Cooper Union, Plaintiffs |
 Photo: Bebeto Matthews/Associated Press |
Cooper Union to Resolve Suit Over Decision to Charge TuitionBy: MIKE VILENSKY OF THE WALL STREET JOURNAL, September 01, 2015 The long-running drama at Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art could be coming to an end. On Tuesday, its board of trustees and New York’s attorney general said they had come to an agreement that would resolve the lawsuit filed against the school last year over its decision to begin charging tuition. As part of the agreement the tuition would remain but the board would install an independent monitor and form a committee to explore ways for the school to return to its previous free model. |
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An elite New York college has agreed to stop charging tuition as soon as it’s ‘practical’BY ABBY JACKSON OF BUSINESS INSIDER, September 02, 2015 New York City’s Cooper Union has agreed to return to a tuition-free model “as soon as practical,” as part of an agreement to settle litigation against the elite college. … The announcement to start charging tuition set off months of infighting and an investigation, by the New York State attorney general, into its controversial decision to start charging tuition. And CSCU filed a lawsuit over the dramatic change in tuition policy. |
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Cooper settles litigation; New committee to focus on return to free tuitionBy: PETER KOO of THE VILLAGER, September 03, 2015 The Board of Trustees of The Cooper Union will enter into a consent agreement with the Committee to Save Cooper Union and the Office of the Attorney General of New York State, according to court papers to be filed in New York State Supreme Court on Wed., Sept. 2. |
 An early 20th-century postcard of Cooper Union. (via RollingRck/Flickr)
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Did Cooper Union Just Get a Second Chance?BY: HRAG VARTANIAN OF HYPERALLERGENIC, September 2, 2015 They said it couldn’t be done, but today’s announcement by the Committee to Save Cooper Union (CSCU) suggests that the turmoil that has engulfed the beloved Manhattan university may be coming to an end. |
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A Path Back to Free for Cooper Union?BY: SCOTT JASCHIK OF INSIDE HIGHER EDUCATION, September 2, 2015
New York State’s attorney general plans to announce a deal today that will substantially change the governance of Cooper Union and could create a path back to restoring the institution’s longstanding but recently abandoned policy of being free to students. |
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Agreement Reached on Lawsuit Over Cooper Union TuitionPHILANTHROPIC DIGEST, September 03, 2015 Under the consent decree signed by the three parties, tuition fees will remain in place, but the board will be expanded to include student trustees, additional alumni trustees, and faculty and staff representatives while a special committee works to develop a plan over the next three years to return the school to a tuition-free model. The agreement also requires transparent disclosure of board materials, budget documents, and investment results, and the creation of a committee to further reform the school’s governance. In addition, the attorney general’s office will appoint an independent financial monitor to evaluate and report on the school’s financial management, including compliance with the consent decree. |
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A New Cooper UnionBY: ANGUS JOHNSTON OF STUDENT ACTIVISM.NET, September 2, 2015 Cooper Union is back from the dead. This afternoon at two o’clock the New York State Attorney General will announce the settlement of a lawsuit filed by the Committee to Save Cooper Union, a group of activist students, faculty, and alumni against the Cooper Union trustees. The settlement will impose various reforms to Cooper Union governance, establish an independent financial monitor for the college, and begin the slow, difficult process of re-establishing Cooper Union as a free, healthy institution. |
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Cooper Union’s Free Tuition May Return After Lawsuit SettlementBY JEN CHUNG OF THE GOTHAMIST, September 2, 2015 After years of roiling tension, New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman will announce a settlement between Cooper Union’s board of trustees and a group of alumni and faculty who sued the school over alleged mismanagement. And free tuition may be back in play. In 2013, the school announced that students entering in 2014 would start to pay tuition, reversing the explicit wishes of Peter Cooper when he founded the school in 1859. However, critics cited poor fiscal decisions—from its new $100+ million Thom Mayne building to spending $350,000 on a former university president’s inaugural celebration to not charging market-rate rent for its Chrysler Building property (yes, the school owns that land!)—as the school’s real undoing. The complaints prompted Schneiderman to investigate the school’s finances, and Cooper Union’s president resigned after the AG’s office started its work. |
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Cooper Union Agrees to Deal to End Lawsuit, Could Lead to Return to Tuition-Free StatusBY: M.H. MILLER OF ARTNEWS, September 2, 2015 Cooper Union has struck a deal–overseen by Eric T. Schneiderman, New York’s attorney general–that could help solve the school’s fiscal crisis, and might also lead the institution to eventually return to its longstanding tuition-free model. The school’s administration started charging students in 2014, breaking Cooper Union’s long tradition of tuition-free education. This is all according to the Committee to Save Cooper Union (CSCU), an organization that has been involved in a legal battle with school trustees, prompting an investigation by the attorney general’s office. |
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Fight Over Cooper Union’s Decision to Charge Tuition Nears an EndBY: CHARLES HUCKABEE OF CHRONICLE OF HIGHER EDUCATION, September 2, 2015 A major battle over the future of the Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art appears to be coming to an end, according to statements released on Tuesday by the prestigious Manhattan college’s Board of Trustees and a coalition of professors, alumni, and students who sued in 2014 to block the board’s plan to start charging undergraduate tuition. |
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Cooper Union’s Leadership Crisis, in 5 Damning AllegationsBY: STEVE KOLOWICH OF CHRONICLE OF HIGHER EDUCATION September 3, 2015 1. George Campbell, Cooper Union’s president from 2001 to 2010, made $350,000 in personal bonuses pushing an imprudent plan to build a fancy new academic building. |
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How one of America’s last free colleges screwed its students and betrayed its legacyBY FELIX SALMON OF FUSION The best piece of in-depth investigative reporting you’re likely to read this week comes not from any journalist, but rather from the office of Eric Schneiderman, New York’s attorney general. His 55-page report into what went wrong at Cooper Union should be required, and sobering, reading for anybody who cares about higher education in America. The story here is narrowly about Cooper Union, and the way in which two presidents – George Campbell first, then Jamshed Bharucha – managed to bring a great institution to its knees, destroying its most precious and unique principle. |
 Cooper Union’s 1858 Foundation Building, left, and its new academic campus, 41 Cooper Square, right. Bebeto Matthews / AP |
How Bad Leadership Cost America One Of Its Only Free UniversitiesBY MOLLY HENSLEY-CLANCY OF BUZZ FEED.COM, September 03, 2015 The report “is unprecedented,” said James Finkelstein, a professor of public policy at George Mason University. “This should be required reading for every board member, every chief financial officer, every university president in the country.” Ryan Craig, the managing director of the investment firm University Ventures and author of a new book on higher education, said he expects increasing attention towards the structure and finances of large nonprofits like NYU. Cooper Union’s faculty and students were part of a larger protest Tuesday in Washington Square Park, where they stood alongside stakeholders at NYU and the New School to decry the “ruinous financial practices” of the three universities. NYU is on the precipice of its own major construction project in Greenwich Village, the neighborhood it shares with Cooper Union, for which it is expected to incur heavy debt. |
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What went wrong at Cooper UnionBY EV GRIEVE BLOGGER ON EVGRIEVE.COM, September 7, 2015 Catching up to a long look at the recent turmoil at Cooper Union … via a piece by Felix Salmon at Fusion. … Cooper Union’s finances are dreadful, and the fact that it charges tuition is a dereliction of everything Peter Cooper stood for. George Campbell, Jamshed Bharucha, and Mark Epstein should be shamed for what they did. |
 The Cooper Union Alumni Pioneer |
Attorney General: Blame the Board of Trustees and their PresidentsBY BARRY DROGIN OF THE COOPER UNION ALUMNI PIONEER During a year when the Cooper Union Community waited for Judge Bannon to settle a lawsuit on whether The Cooper Union is legally required to be free, it is the involvement of the Attorney General’s Charities Bureau, in cooperation with the Committee to Save Cooper Union, which has resulted in a pre-emptive settlement and a negotiated institution of a “Path to Free.” |
 Photo from December 8th rally supporting the occupation of the clock tower. Photo by Michael Fleshman. |
Inside the Battle for Cooper UnionBY ISAAC KAPLAN of ARTSY, September 15, 2015 Calling truce, Cooper Union and the Committee to Save Cooper Union are due to agree on a settlement later this week which will pause years of intense hostility between administrators and students, faculty, and alumni. […] But at Nonstop Cooper’s opening last Tuesday, a community potluck, the mood was relaxed, even festive. It’s the kind of space that enamors artists because everything about it—the large glass windows, the blank walls, the support columns—asks to be made into something else. Much of the kind of artmaking that was overshadowed during the years of protest has the opportunity to blossom again during Nonstop Cooper’s brief life, while FCU turns its attention to the search for a new permanent president of Cooper. |
 Nonstop Cooper members hoist a sign outside of 41 Cooper Square on Monday night. State Senator Brad Hoylman (l) and Attorney Richard Emery (r) look on. (Emma Whitford/Gothamist) |
Cooper Union Alumni: We’re Waking Up From A Bad DreamBY EMMA WHITFORD of GOTHAMIST on September 15, 2015 Dozens of Cooper Union students, teachers and alumni gathered outside of 41 Cooper Square on Monday night to celebrate an impending settlement between Cooper Union’s Board of Trustees, and a group of alumni and faculty that sued the historically-free school last fall over alleged mismanagement, and its recent decision to charge tuition. “This is a message to colleges and universities across New York State to end the corporatization,” said State Senator Brad Hoylman. “Don’t treat your alumni as shareholders and your students as customers.” |
