The Cheektowaga Central School District has been awarded a $2.7 million Pathways in Technology Early College High School (P-TECH) grant from New York State. This collaborative grant will serve students from Cheektowaga Central, Maryvale, Cleveland Hill, Cheektowaga Sloan and Depew. The P-TECH program was developed to bring together K-12 education, higher education and employers to offer an integrated six-year program. Cheektowaga Central applied for the grant and is the lead agent with the assistance and coordination from Erie 1 BOCES.

"This truly is a unique opportunity for our students," said Superintendent Mary Morris. "They can attend Cheektowaga Central, participating in all the social aspects that high school provides, while pursuing an Associate degree and developing close relationships with potential employers in the field of either construction trades or automotive."

Every year for the next six years several eighth-grade students at each school will be selected for the program. Through it they will complete a high school Regents diploma, earn an industry–recognized and cost – free Associate degree through SUNY Erie (formerly Erie Community College); and participate in internships as well as mentor opportunities from our building and construction trades partners.

P-TECH is an exciting opportunity for our students. Since we have received the P-TECH BUILD grant , our students are now eligible for P-TECH RACE, the program founded in the Hamburg-Frontier-Lackawanna schools that provides students with work experience in the automotive fields and Associate degrees in automotive technology or collision repair/auto body.

Benefits to students include rigorous, relevant cross-curricular content around the building and construction trades with work-based learning opportunities and a free Associate Applied Science degree. Through P-TECH, our students will be prepared for a career in a high demand field that pays good wages with assistance from industry mentors.

In grades 9 and 10, students will attend the Potter Career and Technical Center for part of their day and still attend their home school for some of their core subjects. By grades 11 and 12 students will also attend SUNY Erie for their college course work and their home school for the remaining graduation requirements.