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4. Recommendations to the New York State Legislature 

The legislature should be credited for its foresight in launching the STEP and CSTEP initiatives more than a decade ago, and for providing sustained support for these highly successfully programs. There is only one recommendation for state legislators, but it is of overriding importance: 

• The efficacy of these programs is damaged by delays in appropriating funds and by yearly uncertainty as to whether the programs will garner sufficient support to continue. While the Bureau offers multi-year awards to grant recipients, these recipients know that the survival and integrity of their programs depend upon uneven legislative commitment to their work and to the academic success of thousands of under-represented students they serve across New York State. As we have seen, the sustained delays in appropriations in recent years have led programs to eliminate summer institutes and other crucial services. Many highly competent professionals with responsibilities to their families have had to leave these programs, reluctantly, to seek more dependable employment. The energies of program participants also get diverted from the central task of achieving at high levels, by their anxiety about the continued availability of services to them. These programs have done what many regard as all but impossible – leading highly at risk students to excel in society’s most demanding and rewarding professions. The programs, their students, and the state deserve stable and abiding support. 

"The budget issue is like a cloud. There is no sunshine to even look at the programs, to assess them and see how to improve them, when we have to worry so much simply about their survival." – A STEP and CSTEP program leader.

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