Edison's School of Applied Technology hopes partnership helps make students tradesmen

David Andreatta • Staff Writer • July 5, 2008 Since opening in Rochester a century ago as the first vocational high school in the state, the Edison Technical and Occupational Education Center was long renowned as a trailblazing training ground for prospective tradesmen. But over the last decade or so, city education and labor leaders say, the monolithic building on Colfax Street, which now houses four separate high schools, has been producing fewer and fewer graduates capable of entering the skilled trades. "It was a pipeline to our industry (through the) last generation," said Kenneth Warner, executive director of Unicon, a local labor-management organization and construction industry advocate. "It hasn't been a pipeline in this generation." Now efforts are afoot to restore the luster of Edison through a partnership between... [read full story]