United University Professions expects to reach an unprecedented number of New Yorkers with a hard-hitting ad campaign that says SUNY's very survival is at stake.

The campaign is designed to spread the message about the staggering proposed state budget cuts to as many concerned people as possible in New York and beyond. If Gov. David Paterson's latest budget recommendations go through, SUNY will have lost $562.4 million in just two years.

The ads feature SUNY students and parents, a business owner and an average worker who talk about the detrimental effects the cuts will have: Students will drop out. Parents won't be able to afford tuition. Business people foresee an economy that stagnates.

A television ad airing in Albany will continue into next month, and then begin airing in major markets around the state.

An interactive, multi-feature Internet campaign is also running. See it at www.SaveSUNY.org. Viewers can go directly to that site or be directed to it by banner ads appearing on CNN.com, Facebook, Google and other major Web sites.

Once there, viewers can send an electronic letter to their legislator or sign a petition that protests the cuts. The site also lets SUNY supporters send a protest message about the cuts to friends so word about the drastic cuts can go viral.

UUP used a similar Internet strategy to block a proposal by a state health care commission to merge SUNY's Upstate Medical Center with Crouse Hospital. In that successful campaign, support for the hospital and opposition to the merger reached far beyond the UUP membership.

UUP expects that to happen in this new ad campaign, as well.

That's because, as UUP notes — and its ads emphasize — the cuts to SUNY reach far beyond any single campus: New Yorkers can't afford to lose the research capability, the inventive minds and the contributions to local economies that SUNY brings to the state.

Additionally, NYSUT is launching a parallel television and print ad campaign that supports higher education and urges state lawmakers to reject budget cuts.