The New York Advantage
Besides the faculty, the single greatest facility at a Columbia student’s disposal is without doubt the City of New York. Within easy reach by walking, bus, subway, or taxi, New York’s broad range of social, cultural, and business communities offer an unparalleled opportunity for students to expand their horizons or deepen their understanding of almost any human endeavor imaginable. With art from small Chelsea galleries to major museums; music from Harlem jazz clubs to the Metropolitan Opera; theater from performance art in the East Village to musicals on Broadway; food from around the world; and every sport imaginable, New York is the crossroads of the world.
New York is a major player in high- tech research and development, where Fortune 500 companies traded on Wall Street seek partnerships with high- tech startups in Tribeca and Brooklyn. As part of the research community themselves, Columbia students have exceptional opportunities for contact with industry both on and off campus. Senior representatives of these companies often visit Columbia to lecture as adjunct faculty members or as guest speakers, and undergraduate and graduate students frequently undertake research or internships with these and other companies, oftentimes leading to offers of full-time employment after graduation.
In addition to its ties to private industry, Columbia also has a historically close relationship with the public sector of New York, stretching back to the eighteenth century. No other city in the world offers as many impressive examples of the built environment—the world’s most famous collection of skyscrapers, long-span bridges, road and railroad tunnels, and one of the world’s largest subway and water supply systems. Involved in all aspects of the city’s growth and capital improvements over the years, Columbia engineers have been responsible for the design, analysis, and maintenance of New York’s enormous infrastructure of municipal services and communications links, as well as its great buildings, bridges, tunnels, and monuments.