Tech Valley High School is a four-year regional public

high school A secondary school describes an institution that provides secondary education and also usually includes the building where this takes place. Some secondary schools provide both '' lower secondary education'' (ages 11 to 14) and ''upper seconda ...

. It is located on the campus of the

SUNY Polytechnic Institute The State University of New York Polytechnic Institute (SUNY Polytechnic Institute or SUNY Poly) is a public university with campuses in Marcy and Albany, New York. It is part of the State University of New York (SUNY) system. Founded in 1966 ...

Colleges of Nanoscale Science and Engineering in Albany,

New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States New York may also refer to: Film and television * '' ...

, United States. The school opened in September 2007 with a first class of 40 students. Its first class graduated in June 2011 on the campus of the University at Albany.

History

The idea for a

high-tech High technology (high tech), also known as advanced technology (advanced tech) or exotechnology, is technology that is at the cutting edge: the highest form of technology available. It can be defined as either the most complex or the newest te ...

consortium school arose around 2003, according to former Supterintendent of Capital Region BOCES (

Board of Cooperative Educational Services The Boards of Cooperative Educational Services (BOCES //) is a program of shared educational services provided to school districts by the New York State Legislature. History BOCES owes its origin to a state legislative enactment authorizing the f ...

), a regional entity serving multiple school districts, Barbara Nagler, and Superintendent of Questar III, James Baldwin. Former

Governor A governor is an administrative leader and head of a polity or political region, ranking under the head of state and in some cases, such as governors-general, as the head of state's official representative. Depending on the type of political ...

George Pataki George Elmer Pataki (; born June 24, 1945) is an American lawyer and politician who served as the 53rd governor of New York from 1995 to 2006. An attorney by profession, Pataki was elected mayor of his hometown of Peekskill, New York, and went on ...

signed a bill which established TVHS in November 2005. By November 2006, the board of education was named and given the tasks of creating a curriculum around project-based learning, working more closely with local businesses and places of higher education than typical public schools, and spreading the lessons learned on this new form of education to the component school districts of Capital Region BOCES and Questar III. Board of education members were selected from the boards of education of Capital Region BOCES and Questar III. Also in that month, the principal, Daniel Liebert, and director of institutional advancement, Raona Roy, were named. The school opened in September 2007, leasing space from MapInfo in the

Rensselaer Technology Park The Rensselaer Technology Park is a technology park in North Greenbush, New York, USA (though with a mailing address in Troy) operated by Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. As of 2009 the park has over 70 tenants representing a diverse range of te ...

in North Greenbush. TVHS has since moved to the East Campus of

SUNY Albany The State University of New York at Albany, commonly referred to as the University at Albany, UAlbany or SUNY Albany, is a public research university with campuses in Albany, Rensselaer, and Guilderland, New York. Founded in 1844, it is one ...

, and then in 2014 to its current building on the

SUNY Poly College of Nanoscale Science and Engineering The College of Nanoscale Science and Engineering is the college of nanotechnology at the SUNY Polytechnic Institute campus in Albany, New York. Founded in 2004 and formerly a component of the University at Albany, SUNY, the college underwent rap ...

Campus in Albany.

Administration

Tech Valley High is not under the jurisdiction of one

school district A school district is a special-purpose district that operates local public primary and secondary schools in various nations. North America United States In the U.S, most K–12 public schools function as units of local school districts, wh ...

, as is the case of almost all high schools in New York. Rather it is a

consortium A consortium (plural: consortia) is an association of two or more individuals, companies, organizations or governments (or any combination of these entities) with the objective of participating in a common activity or pooling their resources for ...

high school available to any student from any of the component school districts of two

Boards of Cooperative Educational Services The Boards of Cooperative Educational Services (BOCES //) is a program of shared educational services provided to school districts by the New York State Legislature. History BOCES owes its origin to a state legislative enactment authorizing the f ...

(BOCES) in New York's

Capital District A capital district, capital region or capital territory is normally a specially designated administrative division where a country's seat of government is located. As such, in a federal model of government, no state or territory has any politica ...

Capital Region BOCES The New York State Education Department (NYSED) divides the state into nine Joint Management Team (JMT) Regions, excluding New York City. Each JMT contains one or more Regional Information Centers (RIC), which contain one or more Boards of Cooperat ...

and Questar III (Rensselaer-Columbia-Greene BOCES). Any student may apply during

eighth grade Eighth grade (or grade eight in some regions) is the eighth post-kindergarten year of formal education in the US. The eighth grade is the ninth school year, the second, third, fourth, or final year of middle school, or the second and/or final ye ...

to attend Tech Valley High for their high school career. The participating component districts respectively determine how many slots they will each support, and then students are selected by lottery. Students are not required to pay tuition to attend TVHS; the student's home school district pays its respective BOCES (Capital Region or Questar III, depending on location) tuition for the student to attend the school.

Curriculum

All public high schools in New York State are required to follow standards set forth by the

Board of Regents In the United States, a board often governs institutions of higher education, including private universities, state universities, and community colleges. In each US state, such boards may govern either the state university system, individual col ...

of the

University of the State of New York The University of the State of New York (USNY, ) is the state of New York (state), New York's governmental umbrella organization for both public and private institutions in New York State. The "university" is not an educational institution: it i ...

, under the direction of the Commissioner of Education and the

New York State Education Department The New York State Education Department (NYSED) is the department of the New York state government responsible for the supervision for all public schools in New York and all standardized testing, as well as the production and administration o ...

. This includes requirements for students to take and pass

Regents Examinations In New York State, Regents Examinations are statewide standardized examinations in core high school subjects. Students are required to pass these exams to earn a Regents Diploma. To graduate, students are required to have earned appropriate credit ...

. While in traditional high schools, students are taught in classrooms with homework, examinations, projects, and note-taking, TVHS bases its curriculum on project-based learning in a high-tech setting. TVHS fulfills its students' foreign language requirement by offering

Mandarin Chinese Mandarin (; ) is a group of Chinese (Sinitic) dialects that are natively spoken across most of northern and southwestern China. The group includes the Beijing dialect, the basis of the phonology of Standard Chinese, the official language of ...

. Even though students spend all four years of their high school career at TVHS, their diploma actually comes from their home school district.

References

External links

Official School homepage
{{authority control Public high schools in New York (state) Capital District (New York) Schools in Rensselaer County, New York Educational institutions established in 2005 2005 establishments in New York (state)

History

Administration

Curriculum

See also

References

External links