A new, specialized charter high school that would cater primarily to refugees in Syracuse and place focus on agricultural studies may be coming to the city.

OnTECH Charter High School would focus on career technical education in agricultural fields. The idea for the curriculum came from wanting to develop a new career path different from Syracuse’s district schools.

Ellen Eagen, an educational lawyer who has worked with charter schools, is one of the major players in establishing the school.

“OnTECH’s vision is to impassion students by providing them with an education relevant to our community and teaching employable skills that will enable students to get jobs upon graduation or continue on to college,” Eagen said.

Eagan said three of the major educational issues plaguing Syracuse are high dropout rates in high schools, poor transitioning from middle to high school and a lack of students who are qualified to enter the job market even after graduating high school.

“We didn’t want to compete; we wanted to fill in the need the district hadn’t been serving,” said Eagen, in reference to the Syracuse City School District.

Though the school will accept all applicants, OnTECH will be catered specifically to refugees that are part of the refugee resettlement program in Syracuse, Eagen said.

Many of the residents in the program have spent a period of time in a refugee camp and do not have the proper paperwork to transfer into a district school, said Eagen. Many of these refugees are also now too old to enroll.

“How do you remediate, teach (the refugees) English and give them the credits to graduate high school? We saw that as a group that really needed some help,” Eagen said.

Each year, Syracuse generally receives between 1,100 and 1,200 refugees, according to Syracuse.com.

Syracuse is an agriculturally rich area, Eagen said, with over 4,000 farms, ranging from small, family-owned business to large industry farms, such as Chobani and Wegmans. Many refugees come from agriculturally-based countries and could potentially be inspired to go back to school in a community that is focused on green and agricultural jobs, Eagen said.

“We want this charter school to be a community hub for refugee families,” Eagen said.

Central New York also has a lot of lakes and rivers, Eagen said, which could provide an opportunity for lake cleanups or ecosystem research as part of the curriculum. With the agricultural sector growing, qualified graduates are needed more than ever, she said.

“These are real global issues,” Eagen said. “We can create a cutting-edge school around these issues.”

Though no location has been chosen, it is most likely that the charter school will be built in the city’s Northside, where many refugees reside, Eagen said. She added that she is planning on holding meetings in community centers and libraries in the area to educate the community and allow parents to decide if OnTECH is a good fit for their children.

“I’ve been overwhelmed by the positive reception,” Eagen said.

Sustainable Sciences and Technology Foundation, the nonprofit created to accept funds for this project, is submitting a letter of intent to the State University of New York Charter Schools Institute on Friday, Eagen said. The OnTECH Charter School could be open by September 2017, she said.

“This school is important because it offers choice to our current education model and will provide students who have trouble thriving in traditional school settings the ability not only to learn but to get job skills to continue on into the job market,” Eagen said.

Eagen said she hopes the school will be seen as an inspiration for other cities with growing agricultural sectors, especially areas with large populations of refugees.

Published on December 8, 2015 at 10:00 pm

Contact Hanna: hrhorvat@syr.edu