Training the next generation: Graduate studies at The New York Botanical Garden, with emphasis on 1996–2015

Abstract

The purpose of this paper, on the occasion of the 125th anniversary of The New York Botanical Garden, is to provide an overview of NYBG’s graduate studies program along with updated information since the last major review of the program, 25 years ago. Graduate student education has always been, and continues to be, a core mission of The New York Botanical Garden. The program is affiliated six major universities: the City University of New York, Columbia University, New York University, Yale University, Cornell University, and Fordham University. In the 125 year history of the program, the Garden has produced more than 300 graduates, including 216 Ph.D.s and 87 Master’s degrees. Students have focused on floristics, systematics, structural botany, and economic botany; the program has evolved to keep up with the continuous changes in science, with students using the most modern techniques to study plant diversity. Since 1996, the program has produced 93 graduates, including 81 Ph.D.s and 12 Master’s degrees; the Garden’s affiliation with Yale’s School of Forestry and Environmental Studies has produced a dozen graduates; and the Garden’s affiliation with Fordham University, which was reinitiated in 2008, has produced its first graduates. With the growth of the Cullman Program for Molecular Systematics and the Genomics Program in the mid-1990s, student research projects began to incorporate molecular biology (primarily based on DNA sequencing) and to address questions related to genome evolution and evolutionary developmental biology. Technological advances have also changed economic botany research. On the 125th anniversary of NYBG, the hallmark of the graduate studies program is its excellence in teaching and training, with students continuing to integrate data from modern and traditional sources to better understand plant diversity.