This article comes from the Global Desk, a collaboration between The Gazelle and WSN. Read more by searching ‘global’ in either website. 

After the end of the 2013 – 2014 academic year, NYU published a report of NYU’s Global Network. This report was compiled and written by a Faculty Advisory Committee that strove to equitably represent NYU New York, NYU’s two portal campuses in Abu Dhabi and Shanghai and selected study away sites. One of the report’s more notable features is its terminology: the official wording for what some may have expected to be labeled as the Global Network University appears to have changed to NYU’s Global Network.

In an email to The Gazelle, Associate Vice Chancellor Josh Taylor of Global Programs at NYUNY, explained that the current wording gives a clearer description of NYU’s worldwide presence.

“We believe that this slight change in terminology will lead to a clearer understanding of NYU’s global presence and impact. At times, the phrase ‘The Global Network University’ actually triggered confusion, as it sounded as if it could be a standalone entity,” Taylor said.

“Referencing NYU’s ‘Global Network’ still emphasizes that global is integral to the university’s DNA, while avoiding some of the confusion that went along with its predecessor,” he added.

According to NYU’s official branding and language guidelines, the term Global Network University is used to refer to only the strategy, paradigm or vision of NYU’s educational experience … the term [Global Network University] is used rarely. The acronym GNU is never used.”

These guidelines are not always being put into practice. Search for “Global Network University” or “GNU” in your NYU mailbox: You will see that both terms are used in multiple official university emails, including a summer update sent to all NYU Abu Dhabi students and an NYU-wide message from Marty Lipton and Raghu Sundaram, co-chairs of the Joint Committee of NYU Stakeholders.

The Global Network report lists the following guidelines: recommendations that the Global Network should not be developed at the expense of New York’s academic programs, the necessity of maintaining NYUNY “autonomy and traditions” and ensuring that the Global Network adds merit and worth to NYU whilst maintaining a “deep attention to programs in New York.”

Current NYU Abu Dhabi senior Bobby Haynes believes that the wording of the term “NYU’s Global Network” is important in establishing ties between portal campuses, as well as making clear the mission and focus of the university.

Haynes did note that NYU could have done better in explaining guidelines to students, particularly those in leadership or executive positions.

“At least for club leaders and student leaders they could certainly do a better job of getting the word out. I didn’t know about any rebranding that was in the process, really,” said Haynes.

In an interview with Inside Higher Ed, however, NYU President John Sexton emphasized the global nature of NYU, stating that he did not wish for the University to be seen as a continually expanding, perpetually profit-maxing business model with offshoots around the world.

“What the Global Network University — what NYU — is not, is a hub and spoke, with branch campuses,” Sexton explained.

This usage of terminology follows in the footsteps of another amendment to the NYU brand. On May 4, the lettering of the NYUAD logo on the outer wall of the downtown campus was surreptitiously changed from “NYU Abu Dhabi” to “NYU in Abu Dhabi Corporation.” That campus is now gone, but the wording has remained in place, transitioning to Saadiyat along with students and faculty. Nobody explained why the change occurred; students were not explicitly notified. Instead, they noticed the change and quietly began their own dialogue, confused about the implications of this alteration in phrasing.

So far, there has been no official student response, though a Facebook post on May 20, requesting that students like the post in order to express their dissatisfaction with the new logo, garnered 124 likes in just a few days. This post, which of course, cannot be taken to represent the voice of the student body, however tapped into some strains of discontent.

In an opinion piece for The Gazelle, then-senior student Bethany Kolody expressed discomfort with the fact that the change to the NYUAD logo made it essentially identical to all other study abroad sites.

“NYU Abu Dhabi is not, as we were promised, a unique and independent university with loose ties to NYU New York, but is actually a cleverly disguised portal in NYU’s ever-expanding global network,” wrote Kolody.

NYUAD has its own style guide for visual identity and branding, which does not mention or explain the new logo’s visual similarity to those of the Study Away sites. NYU Shanghai’s logo does not conform to the same stylistic guidelines at all.

Not everyone was unhappy with the logo change. Haynes believes that it was instrumental in helping the bridge the divides between NYU’s portal campuses.

“Personally, I don’t have a problem with it because I think it does help with the overall integration of Abu Dhabi into the greater university… having a uniform visual identity helps with getting more Abu Dhabi students to feel part of NYU as a whole and more students here in the Square to accept us,” Haynes said.

“The sense may be that we’re no longer this isolated thing that’s 6,000 miles away that people have never seen or heard of but they just kind of know it exists. And I think that the uniform change helps with that, maybe helps changing mindsets,” he concluded.

Taylor agreed with this sentiment, explaining that the changes have been made so that NYUAD’s logo accurately reflects its vision and place in the Global Network.

“There is a desire to clearly communicate, through both language and logos, that we are all part of New York University… And the process of developing a new logo for NYUAD gave us the opportunity to develop a bilingual treatment, which had been a goal for quite some time.”

“These changes have only one goal: to enable us to more clearly communicate who and what we are as a university. NYU Abu Dhabi has been, and will continue to be, a very important piece of that story,” Taylor concluded.

Email Tessa Ayson at [email protected].