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BOCES local looks for votes from colleagues
December 9, 2004 James Baker Built 36 years ago with a life expectancy of 20 years, the Auburn center that houses nearly 900 students, faculty and staff at Cayuga-Onondaga BOCES is crumbling. Structural columns are rusting, the roof leaks and it's too small to serve a student population that has been growing exponentially for the past five years. Voters in nine school districts in the two Central New York counties go to the polls Dec. 14 to decide whether to replace the current building with a new, $43.5 million BOCES center to be financed through the state Dormitory Authority. "I hope we can get support from all the teachers in the component districts, to help get out the vote so this center can be built," said Jane Donahue, co-president of the Cayuga-Onondaga BOCES Teachers Association. "This building has deteriorated to the point where the state has mandated that we have to do something," said Co-President Jim Baker, a Career and Technical Education teacher at the center. "For the most part, the kids who come here don't have a lot of other supports. If we can't advocate for them and give them the careers they need, I don't know what they'll do." With a steady growth in student enrollment in CTE, special and adult education and alternative ed programs, the center is becoming increasingly overcrowded. Like other Boards of Cooperative Educational Services, Cayuga-Onondaga BOCES provides programs and services to its nine component school districts more efficiently and economically than the districts could provide themselves. Component districts are Auburn , Cato-Meridian , Jordan -Elbridge, Moravia, Port Byron, Skaneateles, Southern Cayuga, Union Springs and Weedsport. |
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