New School Essentials: A Local Guide for New Arrivals
Union Square offers not only a farmer’s market but great art bargains as well.
So you’ve come to terms with the picture on your newcard student ID, assembled a class schedule, and rearranged your room yet again. It’s time to explore your new surroundings. The New School is situated in Greenwich Village, a historic area known for music, literature, and politics in the heart of New York City. And with your newcard and some tips detailed below, you can experience our bohemian neighborhood on a dime.
You might start by browsing the Strand Bookstore’s famous eighteen miles of books, sampling food at the Union Square Farmer’s Market, or wandering the neighborhood’s row house-lined streets that were home to Henry James, Bob Dylan, and Jane Jacobs. Your newcard gets you discounts at nearby establishments, including Barnes & Noble on Fifth Avenue at 18th Street, art supply stores A.I. Friedman and Pearl Paint, and for the fashionably inclined, J.Crew, Club Monaco, and Madewell.
Students are always on the hunt for delicious and cheap eats. Flash your newcard at the Garden of Eden gourmet grocery (7 East 14th Street) to get a ten percent student discount whenever you shop; the food bar is 50 percent off for all shoppers after 8:00 p.m. Your fellow students recommend Num Pang (21 E. 12th Street) for excellent Vietnamese sandwiches. A delectable falafel sandwich from Mamoun’s (119 MacDougal Street), setting you back a mere $3, can fuel a late night at Bobst Library. If you want settle into a cozy café with sit-down dining, Bar Six (502 Sixth Avenue) offers newcard holders ten percent off of their tab.
But there’s more to New York than food and shopping, and New School students enjoy access to some of the most important cultural and political figures of the day at events presented by the university. Public programs are free to students, and with past presenters including Martin Luther King, Jr., Alan Ginsburg, Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, Michael Moore, and Salman Rushdie, are not to be missed. (And when a topic captures your interest, your half-price student subscription to the New York Times and Amazon Student membership makes further research cheaper.) Want a music outing? Check out the many free concerts offered by Mannes College and New School Jazz.
The Office of Student Development and Activities posts other special offers, such as free movie tickets, so be on the lookout for updates here and at my.newschool.edu, the New School community portal that underwent a facelift this summer. Your university email account and the personal records and academic information pages at my.newschool.edu have been updated, and additional features will go online this fall.
The New School itself is a Village landmark. The Johnson/Kaplan Hall on 13th Street, designed by Joseph Urban, is one of the earliest examples of modern architecture, and the Sheila C. Johnson Design Center on Fifth Avenue has won several national awards for its innovative reuse of historic buildings. And be sure to see The University Center, The New School’s flagship building currently under construction on 14th Street and Fifth Avenue. The most recent example of the university’s support of modern architecture, it has already been recognized for its environmentally conscious and striking design.
Finally, don’t forget to download the Student Handbook on my.newschool.edu. In it you’ll find more information to orient you to life at The New School and the Village. And become a fan of New School Facebook page, where you’ll find more useful tips.