Overview of Polytechnic and NYU merge
University of the city of New York, the original name of NYU, began in 1839 with a mission statement of “a social investment and a direct response to the needs of the rising mercantile classes in New York,” intended both for those students “‘who devote themselves to scientific or literary pursuits,’ and for those preparing for ‘the learned professions, commerce, or the mechanical and useful arts.’” [5]. When classes first began, the university temporarily rented a building near City Hall, subjects already included civil engineering, astronomy, and chemistry among other literary and social subjects[6].
When the University founded their School of Engineering; there were only 3 engineering specialized schools in America. The common assumptions of the society at that time were that engineers were that engineers taught themselves and a formal educational background was not a requirement in this line of work. Of course NYU thought otherwise and in 1854, they founded their school of civil engineering and Architecture and even early on produced very notable alumni. The designer of the New York Stock Exchange was created by a graduate of the first class of the school, George Brown Post. The first real skyscraper in New York was also designed by a graduate of the class of 1869, John W. Root [6].
As the industrial revolution grew towards the end of the 19th century there was an increased demand for engineers with a formal schooling background. In 1894, the school of Engineering along with all of the undergraduate schools in NYU officially moved to the Bronx from Greenwich Village to take its new home on the University Heights campus [6]. During the first world war the school now formally changed to the School of Applied Science and officially separated from the university, trained a group of draftees known as the “Fighting Mechanics” and a group of 1600 student army training corps in fields such as auto mechanics, radio operation, and carpentry [6]. A name change followed for the school later in 1920 when they added departments for chemical and electrical engineering, the school then became the School of Engineering.
The war efforts in America seemed to directly link to major changes in the need for engineers and therefore the major changes in schooling for those engineers. We see this during the war effort of the second world war as well when defense courses in engineering were overwhelmed with army recruits. Civilian students were pushed to an accelerated trimester and for the first time the school allowed women to enroll in day classes in order to allow them to work in the aviation field due to wartime men shortage[6].
During the 1970s the school was experiencing an unfortunate financial situation and a struggling undergraduate program. NYU’s graduate and professional programs were always successful from the beginning and had a continued contribution “ contributing to New York’s stunning commercial rise and serving as an engine of upward mobility for thousands of native-born and immigrant New Yorkers” [5] . This fact along with New York city's own urban struggles due to drugs and crime during the time led NYU to sell their University Heights campus where the engineering school was located to the city of New York. With their engineering school no longer having a home, NYU’s School of Engineering merged with the Polytechnic Institute of Brooklyn and became the Polytechnic Institute of New York.
Coming out of their and the city’s plight in the 70’s, NYU saw an opportunity to transform itself “from a respected metropolitan institution to a global seat of learning, in the top tier of world universities”[5]. After all of its woe’s the university In 2008 the relationship grew stronger and the school changed its name to the Polytechnic Institute of NYU also referred to as NYU-Poly. The school had officially become one of the undergraduate and graduate schools of the university. Though the full merger finally took place in 2014 and after more than 3 decades of NYU selling their Bronx campus and losing their engineering school it had finally reestablished one of it’s oldest schools.
NYU poly in the tech innovation era became an incubator for new tech startups and according to a business insider article an example leader for other cities in order to foster tech innovation. Poly also fostered a relationship with the city of New York as well by creating the Center for Urban Science and Progress otherwise known as CUSP [6]. CUSP, poised perfectly in the home of the most prominent urban market and city in the world, brings together leaders of the technology world and world class universities to research and bring about solutions for the pressing issues and of the growing challenges of urban societies. The Polytechnic school located in the metro tech center has also helped create a consortium of technology focused schools and companies in making metro tech the newest growing technology hubs in New York City. CUSP was envisioned to take over the 370 Jay St building, which used to be owned by the city and had long been empty, to help promote the emerging new tech and college town hub in the heart of downtown Brooklyn [7].