CGEC_cg_gabbyAs a freshman at Germantown High School, Gabrielle Cidras attended an open House at the Columbia-Greene Educational Center (CGEC) with her older sister who was interested in the Culinary Arts program. At that time, not old enough to enroll in the program, Cidras told the criminal justice teacher that she would be back in two years.

True to her word, in the fall of her junior year, she enrolled in the two-year Criminal Justice program.

Cidras said she fell in love with law enforcement at five years old. “My relatives who work in law enforcement sparked my interest in it.”

Cidras was an honor roll student and member of SkillsUSA. She and fellow criminal justice teammates from CGEC won the state competition for Crime Scene Investigation in Syracuse and went on to represent New York State at the national competition in Kansas City, Missouri in June 2014.

Cidras graduated from the criminal justice program in June 2014 and is now a freshman at Johnson & Wales University in Providence, Rhode Island, majoring in criminal justice.

“I highly recommend the criminal justice program to other students and loved the hands on exercises,” said Cidras. “I started my freshman year of college with nine course credits.”

Cidras has been accepted for an internship at the New York State Forensics Lab in Queens, and is currently receiving training in forensics for this internship.

Looking ahead after graduation, Cidras hopes to be working in a forensics lab in New York or Massachusetts.

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