The school, which opened in September, is enticing. Built on the slope of a hill and surrounded by acres of pastureland, it is a quarter mile across. The classrooms are spacious and full of the latest technology. But the road there was painful. Some parents from Chautauqua, the wealthier of the two districts, bitterly fought the merger.
Hard feelings persist.
I think you'll need an entire different generation of parents before this is really accepted. Educators tour the campus, mouths agape at what it has to offer, Superintendent Donald Belcer says. I tell them, you can have it too. In fact, that's pretty much what school officials in the four school districts wholely in Cheektowaga say when the subject comes up. And since two of the four districts are struggling, the subject comes up rather frequently.