Assemblyman Cahill to visit migrant education classrooms at SUNY New Paltz

NEW PALTZ — New York State Assemblyman Kevin Cahill will visit the State University of New York at New Paltz Mid-Hudson Migrant Education Outreach Program (MEOP) at 2 p.m. tomorrow, Aug. 13. During his visit, Cahill will meet with Margaret Gutierrez, director of the MEOP, and take a tour of the working classrooms.

The purpose of the assemblyman’s visit, said Gutierrez, is to help familiarize Cahill, who serves on the state’s Higher Education Committee, with the migrant education program at SUNY New Paltz.

“We want to put a face to the program,” said Gutierrez, who has been the director of the program since 1993. “We do not get a lot of money from New York state for migrant education, and we want to make sure the Legislature is aware of the importance of the program when they vote on it each year.”

State Migrant Education funds are used to provide summer school services for migrant youth, including instruction in reading, writing, mathematics content areas and English as a Second Language, where appropriate.

The migrant education program at SUNY New Paltz is a five-week summer program that has served the children of migrant farm workers in the region since 1974. Gutierrez said that about 100 students, K-8, participate in the SUNY New Paltz program, and that she also runs a similar program in the Middletown school district in Orange County.

The MEOP is sponsored by the SUNY New Paltz School of Education.

For more information on the Mid-Hudson Migrant Education Outreach Program, visit www.newpaltz.edu/meop.