RCSD nursing program may be restored
More than three months after approving a budget that made deep cuts to its adult education program, the Rochester school board is considering ways to restore at least part of the losses.
The district's Office of Adult and Career Education Services serves mostly people who have aged out of traditional school. They can get high school equivalency degrees as well as English as a Second Language classes and certification or training in a variety of career fields.
The adult programs are funded mostly through grants, but the district also chipped in $1.2 million in 2015-16. For this year's budget, though, it cut four of 12 job-training programs and said that OACES would need to rely almost exclusively on grant funding going forward. The decision saved about $1 million.
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Part of the reasoning was that many of the services OACES offers are also available elsewhere. Some OACES staff and students, though, objected that other providers — the Rochester Educational Opportunity Center, for example — have higher entrance requirements and thus are not equivalent.
Though the budget decision has already been made, OACES advocates, including the United Christian Leadership Ministry, have spent the summer calling on the district to restore at least some of the programming, and it now appears they may get their way.
School Board President Van White said Thursday that there is some appetite on the school board to restore the certified nursing assistant training program in particular. Unlike some other OACES programs, the CNA training has excellent certification and job placement rates.
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White said the district will speak with local state representatives to see about replacing some of the lost district funding with other grants or state sources. The hope is to find a solution before the school year begins in a few weeks.
"If we don’t have the money ourselves, the question is whether someone else can (replace) that money, or whether the district can find it just as far as the CNA program is concerned," he said.
The Rev. Lewis Stewart, the president of United Christian Leadership Ministry, said he doesn't want to stop at the CNA program, but rather will work toward full restoration of OACES as it has operated the past several years.
"It's one of (the district's) flagship programs, so we're hoping this isn't a Band-Aid approach," he said. "Right now I’m just focused basically on getting OACES restored to its full capacity and ensuring there’s an ongoing flow of funding and grant funds into the program so it’s sustainable ... 20 years from now."
JMURPHY7@Gannett.com