Caretakers at the Long Island State Veterans Home traveled with students and faculty of Stony Brook to voice their concerns at Albany Day on Tuesday about Governor Spitzer's proposed nursing home cuts.

The long-term cuts in the budget, combined with cuts from last year’s budget will result in more than $900 million in cuts. Beyond last year’s budget cuts of over $600 million to nursing home recruitment, retention and quality improvement funding, another $300 million cut has been proposed in this year’s executive budget.

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Stony Brook University President Shirley Strum Kenny said that the university is looking into establishing a law school from scratch after a reported deal to purchase Touro Law school in Central Islip was declared dead in an interview earlier this week.

The founder and president of Touro College, Dr. Bernard Lander, disputed reports that it was ever thinking about selling.

“Touro Law School's charter was never for sale,” said Lander. “There were no negotiations on this subject."

Stony Brook's Southampton campus, home to about 200 students, had a strong showing at Albany day, with nearly 40 percent of the entire campus population in attendance, according to the Southampton Dean Martin Schoonen.

That figure contributed to the record turnout this year, with close to 1,000 total students and faculty from the university making the trip to Albany.

For many of the students and faculty at Stony Brook, the purpose of Albany Day is to give a voice to the groups on campus who wish to speak.

We'll be putting all the videos that come out of Stony Brook Day in Albany here, so stay tuned!

Albany is Red Hot in SBU Colors

Campus shuttle busses transported students from various locations on campus to the South P parking lot where the small army of amateur lobbyists gathered.

Greeted by bagged breakfasts and gallons of coffee at makeshift food stations, students, faculty and administrators climbed onto coach buses at the break of dawn on Tuesday, March 4, to travel up to Albany to lobby legislators in favor of Stony Brook.

Stony Brook University's annual field trip to Albany has always been based on not-so-secret undercurrents of money. Among other things, it seeks to put students face to face with the legislators who determine the state university system's funding.

This year Albany day may prove to be especially important as Stony Brook struggles to expand amidst a shrinking national economy and a state budget deficit.

Despite those factors, the state government is allocating $3.41 billion to SUNY for the 2008/2009 fiscal year, up 1.8 percent compared to last year’s allocation.

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Stony Brook University President Shirley Strum Kenny said in a wide-ranging interview yesterday that a reported deal to purchase Touro Law school in Central Islip was dead, which was the first official acknowledgment from the university that negotiations were even taking place. Stony Brook would now have to start a law school from scratch, said Kenny.

Having recently established business and journalism schools, Kenny said that a law school would be the final piece in the puzzle “putting the Stony Brook campus together.”

Gov. Eliot Spitzer has proposed a multi-billion dollar plan to revitalize New York State’s public university system, graduating it to a level of prestige on par with those in states such as California.

Spitzer’s proposal would add 2,000 new full time faculty jobs, turn two campuses into flagship universities and create a $4 billion endowment to finance future improvements.

Seeking to emulate the prestigious state university systems in California and North Carolina, Governor Eliot Spitzer recently proposed creating two flagship universities within SUNY.

Spitzer named as SUNY’s flagships Stony Brook University and the University of Buffalo, both competitive schools certified by the Association of American Universities. These campuses represent the literal definition of a flagship – a battleship from which the commander directs the action of an entire fleet. They would be expected to lead the rest of SUNY in research, facilities, faculty and prestige.

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Stony Brook University received a $60 million gift from billionares Jim Simons and his wife Marilyn on Wednesday for the creation of a new center for math and physics. This is the largest donation ever given to a New York State university.

In a press conference at Stony Brook's Manhattan campus, Governor Eliot Spitzer in conjunction with President Shirley Strum Kenny, announced the private contribution to Stony Brook University for the creation and endowment of the the Simons Center for Geometry and Physics.

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As hundreds of students, faculty and staff from Stony Brook University embark on a 250-mile journey to the state capitol in Albany to meet with legislators, professors on campus have mixed feelings about the empty seats in their classrooms.

The New York State Commission on Higher Education’s proposal to let large research SUNY schools, such as Stony Brook University, charge higher tuition faces a daunting uphill struggle for acceptance from a legislature that has been long skeptical about reforming higher education.