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People news: Community Bank promotes Cleary to Cato branch manager

Banks & Credit Unions, Employee Benefits & Human Resources, Insurance & Financial Services, People on the Move, Small Business

CATO, N.Y. — Community Bank N.A. announced it has promoted Angela Cleary to branch manager of its Cato office. In her new role, Cleary will

Healthy Teeth, Healthy Finances: Making the Case for Oral Health

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SYRACUSE — A program of the U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA) taught a Syracuse business owner “to rely on community.”

“It’s interesting because that’s a huge part of our business model at the gym. The community here is a huge aspect of what we do,” says Ellen Goldberg, co-owner of CrossFit Syracuse, LLC at 3030 Erie Blvd. East in Syracuse.

Goldberg was among 20 entrepreneurs who were part of the 2019 class in the SBA’s Emerging Leaders program. She spoke with CNYBJ on Nov. 11.

The Emerging Leaders program provides free entrepreneurship education and training for executives of small, “poised-for-growth” companies that are potential job creators, as described in an SBA news release. This “intensive” executive entrepreneurship series includes nearly 100 hours of classroom time. It also provides opportunities for small-business owners to work with experienced coaches and mentors, attend workshops, and develop connections with their peers, local leaders, and the financial community.

When the business launched seven years ago, Goldberg admits she became “entrenched” in her owns ways and thoughts and didn’t really “look outside much” for help and inspiration.

But meeting her fellow entrepreneurs in the program and becoming aware of all the resources available to small-business owners “really opened” her eyes to “rely on others.”

“…and just connect more in the same way that we encourage our clients to do in the gym,” says Goldberg.

Goldberg and husband, Dan, launched the business in September 2012. They currently have 16 employees. CrossFit Syracuse operates in a 5,800-square-foot space.

She learned about the program through one of CrossFit’s clients. “It came at a time when we were heavily thinking about where do we go next with our business,” says Goldberg. “It just seemed like the perfect answer to our problems.”

The Emerging Leaders program “reinforced” the idea that strategic planning is an “ongoing process” in the way that an owner runs a business. “[Planning] isn’t a one-time thing. This is something that we will continue to do and refine every month of every year,” she notes.

The Goldbergs are hoping to expand their space for group-training sessions, but they’re still working to determine the best way to handle such an expansion. They’d also like to expand and grow CrossFit Syracuse’s personal-training program, which has been a “strong” component of the business since it opened, according to Goldberg.

Since its inception in 2008, the SBA’s Emerging Leaders initiative has trained more than 5,000 small-business owners nationally, creating more than 6,500 jobs, generating over $300 million in new financing, and securing in excess of $3.16 billion in government contracts. Now in its ninth year, Syracuse is one of dozens of participating Emerging Leaders locations nationwide.

With the 2019 class, 165 Central New York entrepreneurs have completed the program since it launched in Syracuse.

Tech Garden expansion will add two floors

Construction, Design & Real Estate, Employee Benefits & Human Resources, Energy, Environment & Sustainability, Health Care, Subscriber Only

SYRACUSE — The Tech Garden in downtown Syracuse plans to add two floors, a project that will allow the facility to accommodate more resident-members, some of which are startup companies. Gov. Andrew Cuomo made the announcement during a Nov. 12 visit to Million Air Hangar near Syracuse Hancock International Airport. Cuomo also used his visit

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SYRACUSE — The Tech Garden in downtown Syracuse plans to add two floors, a project that will allow the facility to accommodate more resident-members, some of which are startup companies.

Gov. Andrew Cuomo made the announcement during a Nov. 12 visit to Million Air Hangar near Syracuse Hancock International Airport.

Cuomo also used his visit to announce the completion of the state-supported 50-mile drone corridor between Syracuse and Rome.

Tech Garden expansion

The Tech Garden, currently housed in an existing one-story facility located at 235 Harrison St. in Syracuse, will add a second and third floor to the building with 46,000 square feet of additional incubation and acceleration space.

Empire State Development is assisting the expansion project with up to $12.5 million made available through the CNY Rising Upstate Revitalization Initiative plan.

The project’s total cost of $16.5 million, and the additional $4 million will come from a “variety” of other sources, Elle Hanna, director of communications and media relations at CenterState CEO, tells CNYBJ in an email.

The Tech Garden expects the renovation work to be completed in March 2021.

The expansion will allow the Tech Garden to house 100 resident-members and allow space for the incubators’ 200 virtual-members; will help the incubator to attract more UAS and IoT (Internet of Things) companies; establish programs for “mature company innovation” and support the targeted “Drone Zone,” which will include dedicated spaces that will cater to UAS industry businesses that want to move to the region.

UAS is short for unmanned aircraft system. A UAS includes a drone and equipment used to control its flight. A drone is also referred to in the industry as an unmanned aerial vehicle, or UAV.

The startup incubator is also home to the Genius NY UAS competition, which is now entering its fourth round.

The expanded Tech Garden will serve as the anchor of Syracuse’s City Center Innovation Hub, a “core component” of the Syracuse Surge strategy. It will also be the gateway to the “Innovation Alley” on Warren Street in Syracuse.

Drone corridor

The 50-mile unmanned traffic management drone corridor extends runs from Syracuse to the state UAS test site at Griffiss International Airport in Rome.

Cuomo had announced the $30 million drone-corridor project in November 2016.

The “first-in-the-nation corridor is the most advanced drone-testing corridor in the nation,” Cuomo’s office contends.

With the needed infrastructure now in place, companies will be able to test both unmanned aircraft system platforms and UAS traffic management (UTM) technologies in “real world settings,” generating data that will inform the industry and regulators and “taking us one step closer” toward the routine commercial use of drones.

The completion of the corridor “advances” the region’s collective strategy to accelerate and support emerging uses of UAS in key industries, including agriculture and forest management, transportation and logistics, media and film development, utilities, and infrastructure and public safety.

SU, partners to use grant to support doctoral students in special education

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SYRACUSE — Syracuse University (SU) has secured a portion of a $7.5 million grant from the U.S. Department of Education to support students pursuing doctoral degrees in special education. Florida International University (FIU) and Arizona State University (ASU) are also sharing in the funding, SU said in an Oct. 30 news release. The grant, along

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SYRACUSE — Syracuse University (SU) has secured a portion of a $7.5 million grant from the U.S. Department of Education to support students pursuing doctoral degrees in special education.

Florida International University (FIU) and Arizona State University (ASU) are also sharing in the funding, SU said in an Oct. 30 news release.

The grant, along with matching funds, will support a total of 26 doctoral students in Project INCLUDE (INclusive Consortium of Leaders in Urban Disabilities Education) in the SU School of Education and at FIU and ASU. It will fund eight doctoral students at Syracuse, and they will research ways to address the needs of culturally diverse students with disabilities in inclusive urban settings.

A national recruiting effort is underway to attract a group of applicants who will begin the program in the fall of 2020.

Universities and school districts face shortages of special-education faculty, particularly those who are prepared to work with “culturally and linguistically diverse” students with disabilities, the release stated. Project INCLUDE will boost the ranks of university faculty preparing future teachers for diverse and inclusive classrooms.

“Project INCLUDE will be a leader in creating the next generation of doctoral leaders in inclusive education,” Beth Ferri, professor of inclusive education and coordinator of the doctoral program in special education in the School of Education, said. “To address some of the most pressing issues facing special education, including the school-to-prison nexus and the overrepresentation of students of color in segregated classrooms, there is an urgent need for teacher educators who possess the knowledge and skills to implement culturally sustaining inclusive practices and to improve outcomes of multiple-marginalized students with disabilities in urban schools.”

Co-principal investigators on this grant project are Christy Ashby and Julia White, both associate professors from the department of teaching and leadership in the School of Education.

By recruiting a diverse cohort for the program, Project INCLUDE “will help to diversify” special-education faculty. Research has shown that diversifying the faculty increases the likelihood of success among all students, Syracuse contends.

Students accepted into one of these doctoral programs will work with researchers and their doctoral peers at all three universities. Travel funding will be provided to present joint research projects, and annual research forums will bring students from the three universities together.

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