THE CITY partners with Open Campus on coverage of the City University of New York.

Simíra Smith came to New York City during the height of the pandemic, lived in a shelter for more than a year, survived a  fire and struggled with impostor syndrome.

Now, she’s a budding scientist as one of 465 Macaulay Honors College students to earn a diploma this year from the CUNY honors program. 

“Even though I know what I’m capable of, I always underestimate myself,” she told THE CITY.

As institutions across the country face federal programming cuts, Smith, 21, is one graduate who has already overcome her own set of challenges. 

Originally from Jamaica, Smith graduates today from CUNY’s highly selective Macaulay, where promising city students receive financial and academic in hopes of graduating free of debt. The honors program exists at eight CUNY colleges, including Lehman College in The Bronx, which held its own commencement ceremony last week.  

During the onset of the pandemic in 2020, Smith and her mother moved to The Bronx in pursuit of better economic opportunities. That was after she had bounced around several high schools in Atlanta.

They initially lived in a room in a shared Airbnb apartment among Baychester’s sizable Jamaican population for about two weeks. They then lived in a homeless shelter in Throggs Neck, while Smith finished up at Truman High School in Baychester before starting at Lehman.

“It was a family shelter, but it was still kind of scary,” she said, recalling how she lost weight from eating frozen meals. “I think I felt like I was never going to leave the shelter.”

Her winding daily commute to Lehman from the shelter in Throggs Neck took nearly 90 minutes and required a long walk, a bus ride, a switch to the subway at 125th Street in East Harlem, then a ride back to The Bronx after another transfer.

Approximately 39% of CUNY students struggle with housing instability and 3% experienced homelessness, according to a 2022 survey by Healthy CUNY. Others said they were unable to pay for housing and moved in with others over financial or safety concerns.

Amid that uncertainty, Ferry Point Park offered a safe haven for Smith, one of more than 2,300 Lehman students who earned a bachelor’s degree this year.  

“I would just go to the park, especially when it was getting close to sunset, and just sit and watch the sunset in the park, and it was so beautiful,” Smith said of the open space ading the East River. “I would just go all the way down where the sand is, and sometimes take my shoes off and just feel the sand in between my toes.

“And it kind of reminded me of being in Jamaica and going to the beach.” 

Smith, who says she leaned on her Christian faith and her mother to get through the year in the shelter, was entering the college application process as a Truman senior. 

Though she was initially intimidated by Macaulay, a guidance counselor there encouraged her to apply. After submitting an application minutes before the deadline and interviewing with Lehman staffers, she received an acceptance letter in March 2021.

“I I cried, but it was like happy tears, and it was really one of the best days of my life,” Smith recalled, dubbing Macaulay “the Ivy League of New York” and noting how she preferred Lehman for its science-research classes and the opportunity to stay in The Bronx.

‘I Did That’

While still living in the shelter, Smith began her first semester at Lehman in fall 2021 and immediately sought to tap into the CUNY community, restarting a French club at the Northwest Bronx institution and beginning to see a therapist at the Macaulay’s wellness center. 

“I was going through a lot,” she said.

Following surveys by Health CUNY during the beginning of the pandemic, the university expanded its mental health services by $5 million in late 2020, providing nearly $300,000 to each senior and community college to bolster staff and . 

That therapy helped Smith survive and excel in her classes and that spring, in her second semester, she and her mother moved out of the shelter and into a room in the same Airbnb apartment that they lived in when they first arrived in New York. 

She recalled crying before her sophomore year in college, riddled with self-doubt.

“I really just had to try to encourage myself to keep going, and that’s the only reason why I finished,” she said.

Just days before her Lehman ceremony last Thursday, Smith said she found herself staring at her Macaulay acceptance letter to remind herself of how she overcame insecurity.

“I got here. I’m here for a reason,” she said. “I did that even though I thought that I couldn’t do it.”

Still in the Airbnb in Baychester, Smith spent that sophomore year taking advantage of campus opportunities. She worked for College & Career Bridge For All, a CUNY-wide program that pays students to peer mentor incoming freshmen. She also launched a volunteer group that cleaned up the Van Cortlandt Park Enslaved African Burial Ground.

While entering her junior year in 2023, Smith and her mother moved into their own one-bedroom apartment in Laconia. Smith was returning from a science-research conference in Portland, Oregon when she first entered the new place. 

“I came back at like 12 a.m. on a Sunday morning in October,” said Smith. “And when I walked in, the first thing I said to my mom — she waited up for me — I was like, ‘Life is good.’”

‘I Was Just Happy To Be Alive’

Just eight months later, that jubilation evaporated after a near-fatal fire in the basement of the building. Smith said she could not open her apartment door on the third floor due to heavy smoke in the hallways.

“I praying to God, and I was like, ‘God, please don’t take me,’” she recalled “And at the same time, I saw the smoke stop at the fridge.” 

A short while later, in the commotion, Smith heard glass breaking in a bedroom window.

“The fireman had came in, and he was like, ‘Hello, is anybody here?’” Smith said. “And he came to take me out.” 

In her night clothes, Smith ran straight to her mom. 

“I was just happy to be alive.”  

The scare left Smith questioning whether she would be able to finish school, with thoughts of “Why can’t I get a break?”

Within days, Smith and her mom were back home and now, she is celebrating her challenging path to graduation.

“She kept reminding me how proud she is of me and just to stay focused,” Smith said. “And I had to keep reminding myself that everything else is temporary, but my degree is going to be forever.” 

She is now in the midst of applying to graduate schools in hopes of eventually completing a doctorate in molecular biology and being a cancer researcher. 

“I want to be a scientist, a Ph.D., who really helps people when they have diseases because, honestly, curing diseases starts at the bench,” Smith said. “Treatments start at the bench before it goes to the bedside.” 

Smith said she sometimes still can’t grasp that she’s a CUNY graduate. 

“I keep talking to my mom, and I’m like, ‘Damn, can you believe that you have a college graduate?’ she said.