Statutory colleges

In American higher education, particular to the state of New York, a statutory college or contract college is a college or school that is a component of an independent, private university that has been designated by the state legislature to receive significant, ongoing public funding from the state. The statutory college is operated by the university on behalf of the state, with the mission of serving specific educational needs of the state. New York's statutory colleges are administratively affiliated with the State University of New York (SUNY) system, and receive funding from SUNY's operating budget. There are five statutory colleges: four located at Cornell University and one located at Alfred University.

The terms "statutory college" and "contract college" derive from the fact that each of these dually affiliated colleges or schools is operated independently from the state pursuant to statute or under contract with the state. In the case of Cornell University, the colleges and schools that do not receive direct funding from the state are generally referred to as endowed colleges, to differentiate them from the statutory colleges. On other campuses they are called "private."

The New York State Education law uses both "contract college" and "statutory college" to describe these state-supported colleges.

The four statutory colleges located at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, are:

Another statutory college, the New York State College of Forestry, was founded at Cornell in 1898, only to be closed in 1903 when outcry over a pending lawsuit led Gov. Odell to veto the appropriations bill that provided funding. However, forestry education was continued at Cornell as part of the College of Agriculture. The College of Forestry was later reestablished at Syracuse University in 1911. Two of Cornell's current statutory colleges — the NYS College of Agriculture and Life Sciences and the NYS College of Human Ecology — existed as non-state-supported colleges (as the College of Agriculture and the School of Home Economics, respectively) before state legislation was enacted to make each a state-supported entity. The NYS College of Human Ecology and the NYS College of Veterinary Medicine trace their origins to Cornell's agriculture college. However, the College of Veterinary Medicine was actually the first statutory college in New York. The Hotel School started in 1922 as a department within Home Economics, but became a separate, endowed college in 1954.

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