New School University is an innovative educational institution founded as a bastion of intellectual and artistic freedom. At the New School, education is seen as a tool to produce positive changes in society. The University excels at providing transformative ideas and skills to its students. Education and research at New School University are guided by a linkage of theory and practice, and members of the University community are committed to working towards a more equitable, peaceful world.

The New School pioneered the idea of lifelong University-level education for adult students. Today, it is a residential university in which 7,000 students are enrolled in graduate and undergraduate degree programs. Celebrated for its social science, humanities and public policy initiatives, New School University has grown into one of the largest arts education resources in the nation, and the majority of degree students register in arts programs

The founders of the New School supported controversial ideas and opposed the curtailment of free inquiry at their own universities. Visionaries all, they probably could not have foreseen that their "new school" would take root and thrive, much less grow into a large, diversified urban university that would continue to embrace their mission. That this occurred testifies not only to the prescience of their original idea, but also to the dedication of many hundreds of innovative teachers and generous patrons who have sustained it and built upon it for more than eight decades.