Buffalo Academy of Science students start first day on Medaille campus

BUFFALO, N.Y. (WIVB) — After nearly 100 years, Medaille College closed it’s doors back in 2023.

A little over a year later, those doors were swung back open welcoming nearly 600 Buffalo Academy of Science Charter High School students for a new chapter on campus Monday.

Former Medaille University campus sold to charter school developer

“We’ve been working really hard this summer and the end of last school year, just converting the Medaille campus into a high school as much as possible,” said BuffSci at Medaille High School principal, Ashley Piazza.

“It’s a real game changer for us at Buffalo Sci,” said board chair of the Buffalo Academy of Science Charter School, Ismet Mamnoon. “We had been bursting at the seams in our old high school building and we were so keen to find a new place to host our high school students.”

Buff Sci at Medaille gives the school a chance to expand. It also gives students a chance to envision themselves in higher education, as they walk through the doors that college students once walked before.

“We wanted to keep the name,” said executive director of Buffalo Academy of Science Charter, Joseph Polat. “We wanted to keep the legacy and history of the name of Medaille because that’s part of Buffalo. Plus, it’s a historic building, we wanted to keep all of the historic elements in the building … and we wanted to preserve the memory of this beautiful space for Buffalo for many years.”

The halls now hold lockers and they have bigger classrooms to help teach more students as they transformed the main building into a high school, while maintaining the history. They have a capital campaign to raise funds, hoping to make the campus the school’s permanent home and to serve students and the community around them.

Board chair Mamnoon says the school plans to open a discovery center.

“We have an incredible robotics program, we’re going to be hosting a regional robotics competition and we’re hoping to really use this facility to host community events,” she said.

“We have so much opportunity here for the whole campus,” said principal Piazza.

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Hope Winter is a reporter and multimedia journalist who has been part of the News 4 team since 2021. See more of her work here.

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