Urban Youth Collaborative

The Urban Youth Collaborative is proud that our months of meetings with legislators, trips to Albany, rallies, press conferences, and our historic student walk out last week appear to have paid off. “We are encouraged that our push to save student MetroCards has brought our state officials together to make a tentative deal to keep the program–and we commend lawmakers on their attention to this issue,” said Valerie Bynaar, 14, youth leader with the UYC. “It is unthinkable that public school students would have to pay to travel to school, and we hope that this fix for the next year is included in the final budget. We look forward to the City, State, and MTA developing a long-term solution to guarantee free transportation for NYC students.” UYC is especially proud that this work was led by those most directly affected by the cuts–low-income students from communities of color.

In December 2009, the MTA announced that they were going to cut the free Student MetroCard program following Governor Patterson’s cutting of funding to the program. This means that families would be responsible for paying the almost $1000 a year, per child for transportation to school. THAT ‘AINT RIGHT! EVERY New York City public school student has a RIGHT to an education that best prepares them for success in the future. The city and state of New York have the RESPONSIBILITY to provide not only that education as well as the means of transportation to the schools that provide education!!