VESTAL, NY – (WIVT/WBGH) Binghamton University has announced its collaboration with the Thurgood Marshall College Fund to foster new educational opportunities and shape the future of academics.

Binghamton has partnered with six Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs): Alabama A&M University, Central State University, Tuskegee University, Prairie-View A&M University, the University of the District of Columbia and Virginia State University, in the New Educational Research Alliance known as New ERA.

This alliance is the university’s latest plan to advance education and strengthen partnerships with other schools. The alliance will serve as a catalyst for future research collaborations between faculty and students by pooling resources, knowledge, and experience between participating universities. The areas of focus include Artificial Intelligence (AI), cybersecurity, healthcare, biomedical engineering, and many more. The partnership also will support HBCUs in their pursuit of a high research Carnegie classification.

“Binghamton has a reputation of being a great research university, and some of our HBCUs are on the verge of becoming great in some areas,” said N. Joyce Payne, founder of the Thurgood Marshall College Fund. “This was a prime opportunity to bring the two communities together to start the conversation.”

Plans for the alliance emerged after a 3-day conference held at Binghamton University organized by the Thomas J. Watson College of Engineering and Applied Science. Students and staff from participating schools discussed the partnership and heard from various speakers.

“In the SUNY system, we’ve never had an outreach effort like this, so Binghamton is leading the way. We are approaching this in the sense of true collaboration — we’re equal partners in this, each bringing our own strengths and our own weaknesses, our own needs and our own aspirations. I think that bodes well for the future.” said Executive Vice President for Academic Affairs and Provost, Donald Hall.

The partnership plans to nurture the next generation of diverse students by using education and research to address challenges faced by society.