AUBURN - A group of high school students didn't have to go to medical school to learn how to suture flesh wounds.

In fact, they had to look no further than the Cayuga-Onondaga Board of Cooperative Educational Services New Visions Medical Professions program.

Hands in gloves and mouths covered by surgical masks, about 11 high school seniors from Cayuga and other counties met in a classroom a floor below the Auburn Memorial Hospital Circulation Desk Wednesday and practiced their suturing skills by stitching together two pieces of synthetic flesh.

Split off into groups of two or three, the students assumed the roles of surgeon, scrub nurse and circulating nurse - the surgical team - congregated around a wooden table serving as a mock operating room.

Tweezers clutching a threaded needle, New Visions student Andrea Murphy tended to the mock wound while students Tami Densen and Craig Hunter, both of Auburn, offered assistance.

Murphy, of Skaneateles, pierced the first piece of flesh and came up through the second, stitching them together.

“Nurse, can you hold that please,” she said, asking Denson to hold the thread as

Murphy secured the stitch.

“Look at that!” Murphy exclaimed looking at her work as her teacher, Kelly Harrington, passed by.

Harrington looked down at Murphy's work.

“Look at these stitches,” Harrington said. “It looks like you do this all of the time.”

Murphy replied, “Didn't I tell you I was a surgeon on the side?”

This scene may be unusual in high schools, but not at New Visions. These 11 students opted to spend their senior year of high school learning about medicine first-hand instead of strictly from a book. They come to AMH four hours every day, shadowing nurses, observing surgeries in the OR, going on rounds with doctors, and watching health care providers help those admitted to the emergency room. They have even seen doctors, nurses and paramedics try to resuscitate people that have gone into cardiac arrest.

“You see a broad spectrum,” said Sarah Kilcer, of Genoa. “I've gone from seeing the assessment of a birth to the final stages of death. I love it.”

The Medical Professions course is but one of five New Visions programs offered by BOCES to give graduating and college-bound high school seniors a chance to not only study but also actively participate in career fields. Students earn three to four high school credits - English 12, Economics 12, Government 12 and one or two electives - and nine college credits from Cayuga Community College while being exposed to the ins and outs of their preferred field of study.

New Visions offers programs in environmental science and technology, legal professions, business and media communications, teacher education and medical professions. Students have four hours of blocked time in their respective program, running from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.

The New Visions model was developed over 10 years ago as a way to give students at the end of their high school experience a chance to see what life is like outside of the school building, said BOCES superintendent Bill Speck.

“These kids were ready to step up to the challenges in learning professional communications,” he said.

The BOCES professional studies program offers to students a chance to explore their preferred field before committing to a two- or four-year college in that specified area.

“It gives them a chance to taste the field, learn in field and, most importantly, work day to day with professionals that are doing the work,” he said.

That holds true for the New Visions Legal Professions class. In just a few months students will learn about crime scenes, evidence collection and how to complete crime scene documents. And they will learn this information from Detective Fred Cornelius of the Cayuga County Sheriff's Office and Sgt. Joseph DiVietro from the Auburn Police Department, said teacher Al Pola, a former police officer and attorney.

“I think the primary purpose is to prepare them for post-high school studies,” he said, “That entails knowing how to write, read, research, critically analyze and discuss things on a college level while they're still in high school. What I found is past students telling me how successful and easy college is for them, especially the first year, because of how the program is set up and the things they are forced to learn at an earlier stage.

“We take that together with hands-on training in the legal field so that they not only have a better understanding of what the legal field does for the community,” he continued, “but also through hands-on practice they get a better understanding if this is something they would want to do for the rest of their lives.”

Pola has been teaching handcuffing techniques in his class, one technique a month. With law enforcement belts around the waste and a baton in the beltloop, these students practiced these techniques on each other.

“Your under arrest,” said Bart Cutten, of Skaneateles, to suspect Mary Pat Thompson, of Skaneateles. “Place your hands at your sides and show me your palms. Turn to the wall. Get on your right knee. Get on your left knee. Cross your feet. Don't move.”

Hands clutching a non-functional training gun, Cutten cautiously walked over to the suspect.

“Raise your right arm toward the sound of my voice,” he said. Thompson complied and Cutten cuffed her hand. “Raise your left arm toward the sound of my voice.” She complied again and Cutten cuffed her other hand.

Cutten joined New Visions Legal Professions because he didn't know what he wanted to do in college.

“It directed me to a certain area and I ended up liking it a lot,” he said, now an aspiring attorney.

Sarah Black knew she wanted to go into the legal field, but she didn't quite know where she fit in.

“You get to try a lot of different things,” she said. “It really helps to learn what you want to do and what college life will be like.”

New Visions is planning for the 2008-09 academic year and as such is hosting an informational session for all interested people at 7 p.m. Jan. 31. The information session will feature a brief orientation with a slide show presentation. Each New Visions program will have a booth manned by the program teacher and current students, and another booth will explain the college credits available through the program.

Staff writer Alyssa Sunkin can be reached at 253-5311 ext. 239 or alyssa.sunkin@lee.net