The New School

The New School is a private research university in New York City, New York, United States. It was founded in 1919 as The New School for Social Research with a mission dedicated to academic freedom and intellectual inquiry and a home for progressive education. Since then, the school has grown to house four divisions. These include the Parsons School of Design, the Eugene Lang College of Liberal Arts, the College of Performing Arts (which includes the Mannes School of Music) and The New School for Social Research.

In addition, the university maintains the Parsons Paris campus and has also launched or housed a range of institutions, such as the Healthy Materials Lab, the Institute for Race, Power, and Political Economy, World Policy Institute, the India China Institute, the Observatory on Latin America, and the Center for New York City Affairs. It is classified among "R2: Doctoral Universities – High research activity". Approximately 8,500 students are enrolled in undergraduate and postgraduate programs. Over 70 percent of students are in the creative areas of design, performing, and fine arts.

History

Name

From its founding in 1919 to 1997, the university was known as The New School for Social Research. Between 1997 and 2005 it was known as New School University. The university and each of its colleges were renamed in 2005.

The New School established the University in Exile and the École libre des hautes études in 1933. It was designed as a graduate division for largely Jewish scholars escaping from Hitler and other adversarial regimes in Europe. In 1934, the University in Exile was chartered by New York State and its name was changed to the Graduate Faculty of Political and Social Science. In 2005, it adopted what had initially been the name of the whole institution, the New School for Social Research, while the larger institution was renamed The New School.

Founding

The New School for Social Research was founded by a small group of university professors and intellectuals in 1919 as a school where adult students could "seek an unbiased understanding of the existing order, its genesis, growth, and present working". Founders included economist and literary scholar Alvin Johnson, historians Charles A. Beard and James Harvey Robinson, economist Thorstein Veblen, and philosopher John Dewey. Beard, Dewey, and Robinson were all faculty at Columbia University and all supporters of the Great War.

Events at Columbia University helped to precipitate the emergence of The New School. In October 1917, Columbia University suppressed faculty criticism of the United States's entry into World War I. Columbia fired two professors who were critical of both Woodrow Wilson and Nicholas Murray Butler, Columbia University's president. In response, Charles A. Beard, Professor of Political Science, resigned his professorship at Columbia in protest, though he supported the war. His colleague James Harvey Robinson, who also supported the war, resigned in 1919. Both Beard and Robinson became founders of The New School. John Dewey chose to remain on the faculty of Columbia.

The New School's plan was to offer the rigorousness of a college education without degree matriculation or degree prerequisites. The institution was theoretically open to anyone, as is the adult division today, which today is called the Schools of Public Engagement. The SPE remains part of The New School. The first classes at The New School took the form of lectures followed by discussions, for larger groups, or as smaller conferences, for "those equipped for specific research". In the first semester, 100 courses, mostly in economics and politics, were offered by an ad hoc faculty that included Thomas Sewall Adams, Charles A. Beard, Horace M. Kallen, Harold Laski, Wesley Clair Mitchell, Thorstein Veblen, James Harvey Robinson, Graham Wallas, Charles B. Davenport, Elsie Clews Parsons, and Roscoe Pound. Within a few years, the faculty expanded, particularly in the performing arts, to include Aaron Copland, Martha Graham, Doris Humphrey, Charles Seeger, Henry Cowell, and the Group Theater. Decades later, The New School began to offer degrees in line with the traditional university model. John Cage, who came to study at The New School in 1933 with the experimental composer Henry Cowell, taught at The New School from 1950–1960, including courses such as Experimental Composition and Mycology. Cage's teaching at the school inspired the founding of Fluxus, through his students, including Yoko Ono. Cage was forced out by the Graduate Faculty who did not feel that he was appropriate to their ideal of an academic professor.

Organization

The New School is divided into autonomous colleges called "divisions". Each one is led by a dean and has its own scholarships, standards of admission, and acceptance rates.

Academics

Similar to many liberal arts colleges, The New School's Lang College has a "student-directed curriculum", which does not require its undergraduates to take general education courses. Instead, students are encouraged to explore before focusing on a major, selecting topics that are of interest to them. An exception to this is in the performing arts, where students must declare majors at enrollment. Although all "New Schoolers" are required to complete core training—usually of a literary, conservatory, or artistic nature—students are expected to be the primary designers of their own curriculum.

The university offers 81 degree/diploma programs and majors. Faculty members teach most of their classes seminar style and the student/faculty ratio is about 10:1.

Undergraduate admissions

In 2024, The New School accepted 62.5% of undergraduate applicants, with admission standards considered difficult, applicant competition considered low, and with those enrolled predicted to have an average 3.59 high school GPA based on a large sample of college GPA data since the university has not published its high school GPA data for incoming freshman. The university does not consider standardized test scores, the university having a test blind policy. Those enrolled students that had taken standardized tests had an average 1250 SAT score (34% having scores) or an average 28 ACT score (16% having scores).

Dual degree programs

The university offers a range of dual degree programs. These include a Bachelor of Arts and Bachelor of Fine Arts (colloquially called the "BA/FA pathway") program or a Bachelor of Arts and master's program. The former is a comprehensive five-year program that allows students to obtain their B.A. from Eugene Lang College and their B.F.A. from either Parsons or School of Jazz and Contemporary Music. The latter is also a five-year program that allows students at Eugene Lang to obtain their masters from the New School for Social Research. The university also offers a Master of Arts Management and Entrepreneurship program, which can be obtained along with either a Bachelor of Music (Mannes) or a Bachelor of Fine Arts (drama or jazz) in five-years.

Institutes and research centers

Various institutes and research centers at The New School focus on specific fields of study:

• International affairs and global perspectives
• Philosophy and intellectual culture
• Humanities Action Lab
• Politics, policy, and society
• Art, design, and theory
• Environment
• Urban and community development
• Center for Attachment Research
• Center for New York City Affairs
• Center for Public Scholarship

Campus

The New School's campus is centered on the area immediately south of Union Square in New York's Greenwich Village. Exceptions are some dormitories and other administrative buildings that are located in Chelsea, Stuyvesant Park, and the College of Performing Arts in the West Village.

University Center

The New School opened the 16-story University Center ("UC") at 65 5th Avenue in January 2014.

While the 65 Fifth Avenue plans were initially controversial among students and Village residents (spurring in 2009 a major student occupation that was held at The New School's previous building on that site), plans for the University Center were adjusted in response to community concerns. In a review of the University Center's final design, The New York Times architecture critic Nicolai Ouroussoff called the building "a celebration of the cosmopolitan city".

The UC serves as a central hub for all university students, though the majority of classrooms and studios are in use by Parsons. The tower, which was designed by Skidmore, Owings and Merrill's Roger Duffy, is the largest capital project the university has undertaken. The building added classrooms, new residences, computer labs, event facilities, and a cafeteria to the downtown New York City campus in addition to a library, and lecture hall.

Historical significance

Several of the university buildings are New York City designated landmarks. Among these is the egg-shaped Tishman Auditorium, an interior landmark. It was designed by architect Joseph Urban, along with the entirety of The New School's 66 West 12th Street building, the last major project Urban designed. Writer's forums, author visits, political debates, award ceremonies, academic lectures, performances, and public hearings are held for both the academic community and general public throughout the year in Tishman.

Newer buildings have received awards. Among these is The Sheila Johnson Design Center, which attracted media attention for its design. In 2009, it won the Society for College and University Planning's Excellence in Architecture Renovation/Adaptive Reuse Award. In addition to being a Parsons core academic building, the center also serves as a public art gallery. The New School Welcome Center, located on 13th Street and Fifth Avenue, won the American Institute of Architects, New York Chapter's Interiors Merit Award in 2010.

Centennial

In October 2019, the university celebrated its centennial with The Festival of New.

Libraries

The New School currently maintains three library locations and its Archives & Special Collections in New York City and is a member of the Research Library Association of South Manhattan. In 2009, its libraries counted a total of 1,906,046 holdings.

• Fogelman Social Sciences and Humanities Library (migrated to the List Center)
• Kellen Archives – design and Parsons' history (migrated to Archives & Special Collections)
• Visual Resource Center (no longer active)
• Adam and Sophie Gimbel Design Library (migrated to University Center Library in 2013)
• Alexis Gregory Library for the Performing Arts (migrated to broader university library system in 2026)
• Archives & Special Collections
• University Center Library – art, design, and technology
• List Center Library – humanities and social sciences

Art collection

In 1931 the New School commissioned two mural cycles: José Clemente Orozco's "A Call for Revolution" and "Universal Brotherhood" and Thomas Hart Benton's epic America Today. The New School Art Collection was established in 1960 with a grant from the Albert A. List Foundation. The collection, now grown to approximately 1,800 postwar and contemporary works of art, includes examples in almost all media. Parts of it are exhibited throughout the campus. Notable artists such as Andy Warhol, Kara Walker, Richard Serra, and Sol LeWitt all have pieces displayed in New School's academic buildings.

Publications

Academic journals

The New School publishes the following journals:

Other university publications

re:D, the magazine for Parsons alumni and the wider Parsons community, published by the New School Alumni Association.

The New School Free Press, abbreviated as NSFP, is a student-run newspaper covering events around The New School. Periodic printed editions are distributed in newsstands across campus, while their website publishes continuously updated content.

LIT, a nationally distributed literary journal – contains works selected by the MFA Creative Writing Program

12th Street, a nationally distributed literary journal from The New School's Riggio Honor Program that contains work from undergraduate writers at the university

• Eleven and a Half, the literary journal of Eugene Lang College
• NEW_S, an e-newsroom showcasing The New School in major media, major student and alumni achievements, university programs, and other news
• Canon Magazine, a quarterly publication of student writings published by The New School for Social Research

Public Seminar is a journal dedicated to the intellectual and cultural understanding of democracy through the lens of design, the social sciences, performing arts, and humanities. Public Seminar is produced by New School faculty, students, and staff, and supported by colleagues and collaborators around the world.

Scapes, the annual journal of the School of Constructed Environments

BIAS: Journal of Dress Practice, a journal published by the MA Fashion Studies Dress Practice Collective started in the spring of 2013 that aims to join elements of "visual culture, fashion theory, design studies and personal practice through a variety of media".

Broadcasting

WNSR, or New School Radio, is a student-run online-only news and opinion outlet for all divisions of The New School. Programming is produced by graduate and undergraduate students and delivered in the form of episodic streaming and podcasts. It was established in 2010.

NSCR, or New School CoPa Radio, is an online radio station run by the College of Performing Arts (CoPa) and spans a wide range of genres, and features more than 400 artists, 500 albums, and 3,840 individual tracks and songs, all by students, faculty, alumni, and staff from CoPa divisions, including the School of Drama, School of Jazz and Contemporary Music, the Mannes School of Music, as well as alumni from the wider New School community. The station was established in 2021.

New Histories is a faculty-run podcast show at The New School that focuses on the university's history.

Unbound is a student-run podcast show at The New School that focuses on philosophy.

Student life

Student organizations

The New School houses over 50 recognized student organizations, most of which are geared towards artistic endeavors or civic engagement. Notable among these are The Theatre Collective, which stages numerous dramatic productions throughout the year, Narwhals on Broadway, Students for a Democratic Society (SDS), the New School Debate Team (intercollegiate competition in Policy/Cross Examination style debate), ReNew School (sustainability and environmental advocacy group), Moxie (feminist alliance), the New Urban Grilling Society (NUGS), and The Radical Student Union (RSU).

Athletics and recreation

The department began in December 2008 under its original name Recreation and Intramural sports. The McBurney YMCA is where intramurals continue to be held on Wednesday nights.

The Narwhals feature several intercollegiate teams: basketball (2009), cross country (2010), cycling (2013), soccer (2013), tennis (2014), ultimate Frisbee (2014). The New School Narwhals are an independent school, unaffiliated with the NCAA, but regularly compete against NCAA Division III schools.

• Basketball – competes regularly against Cooper Union, Culinary Institute of America, Pratt Institute, and Vaughn College
• Cross Country – competes in CUNYAC and HVIAC conference invitationals as an unaffiliated school
• Cycling – a member of the Eastern Collegiate Cycling Conference
• Soccer – competes against Cooper Union, Culinary Institute of America, St. Joseph's College, and Vaughn College

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