BY ROBBIE SEQUEIRA
Unvaccinated CUNY students
face the possibility of
academic withdrawal if they
can’t produce proof of full COVID
19 vaccination status by
Oct. 7, leaving many students
ineligible to receive tuition refunds
or have their fi nancial
aid jeopardized by failing to
comply with the mandate.
Christina Vazquez, one
of roughly 500 unvaccinated
Hostos Community College
— a school within the CUNY
system — students who could
be dropped by Oct. 7, told the
Bronx Times she was under
the impression that her vaccination
status wasn’t going
to affect her learning opportunities
since she was taking
a course load that was fi lled
with hybrid and remote-only
courses.
For the fall semester,
which started on Aug. 25, a
full course load for Hostos students
who are New York residents
tuition costs $2,400. For
a four-year public university
within the CUNY network,
such as Lehman College, fulltime
students who are New
York residents pay in the
neighborhood of $3,465 per semester.
According to CUNY’s mandate,
unvaccinated students
currently enrolled in hybrid
or in-person courses for the
fall semester faced a deadline
of Sept. 23 to receive the single
dose Johnson & Johnson vaccine
and upload proof of vaccination
to their campus app
CUNYfi rst by Sept. 27 in order
to remain eligible to access
CUNY campuses and facilities.
Documentation of vaccinations
must be approved and
verifi ed by CUNY offi cials by
Oct. 7, and the process takes
up to 10 days to approve. Those
who fail to comply with CUNY’s
policy will be forcibly
withdrawn from classes, and
are in jeopardy of losing their
fi nancial aid.
Hostos Action Committee
members, comprised of CUNY
faculty and employees, say
that students could lose up to
in fi nancial aid and tuition
dollars if they are dropped by
the end of the week.
“Not once did any administrator,
or person from the
registrar’s offi ce tell us that
COVID-19 testing wouldn’t
be available,” Vazquez said.
“They were happy to get us to
cough up the money and now
they’re going to probably to
keep it.”
This issue for CUNY employees
and students protesting
the policy on Wednesday
in front of Hostos in the Grand
Concourse section of the
Bronx is not over vaccinations
and safety. Instead, campus
action groups are calling out
CUNY administrators for an
“attempted money grab,” by
not adequately communicating
its vaccination mandate to
students during registration
for the fall semester.
“It’s another week, another
crisis by the CUNY administration,”
said Aaron Botwick,
a member of the Hostos Action
Committee. “We believe in the
vaccine mandate, but we believe
that CUNY offi cials were
not being honest brokers with
students when they were registering
for classes.”
In their vaccinate mandate,
CUNY schools require
that students who are unable
to receive the vaccine must
provide documentation for
religious or medical exemptions,
along with a negative
COVID-19 test within seven
days of an on-site visit.
BRONX TIMES R 8 EPORTER, OCT. 8-14, 2021 BTR
Withdrawals from classes
only occur, according to CUNY’s
policies, if the student
has an on-site class, which includes
hybrid courses.
An estimated 55,000 students
are enrolled in the city’s
25-campus public university
system known as CUNY,
which includes three Bronx
schools Hostos Community
College, Bronx Community
College and Lehman College.
The Bronx Times reached
out to CUNY Central Offi ce
administrators for comment
and statistics on its unvaccinated
students but they did
not respond with the Times’
request.
On May 10, then-Gov. Andrew
Cuomo announced that
once COVID-19 vaccines were
fully federally approved,
CUNY and SUNY students
would be required to receive
the vaccine to attend in-person
classes this fall. In July,
CUNY reported that 59% of
its students were fully or partially
vaccinated.
Initially, CUNY’s reopening
plan for the in-person fall
2021 semester allowed for remote
only students to provide
proof of a negative COVID-19
test in order to visit campus,
but the latest announcement
mandates vaccinations.
CUNY Chancellor Félix Matos
Rodríguez announced in an
email on Sept. 3 — more than
a week after the fall semester
had already begun — that testing
will no longer be an option
for unvaccinated students,
even those taking remote-only
courses who want to visit a
CUNY campus, starting Oct.
7.
“I am amending the policy
that permitted unvaccinated
students to visit campuses if
they showed proof of a negative
COVID test,” Matos Rodriguez
said. “Starting on
Oct. 7, all students taking remote
only classes who wish
to visit a campus at any point
this fall for any reason must
be fully vaccinated.”
Hostos faculty and students
told the Bronx Times that outside
of one blast email sent by
administrators to students on
Sept. 3, nearly a month after
many registered for classes by
August, they were not given a
directive on the vaccine mandate.
“Sending one mass email
is not an effective messaging
tool, especially when students
Unvaccinated
CUNY students
facing academic
withdrawal, loss
of tuition