Every community has its own lights and pillars. Individuals who are making a difference, shining brightly and having a profound impact on both the present and the future. Cara Cliffe, the instructor of the CTE (Career Technical Education) program at William Floyd High School in Mastic Beach is undoubtedly one of them. Teaching, helping, and inspiring her students to be the best that they can be and far beyond.
Cara grew up in Medford and graduated from Patchogue-Medford High School in 2015 before she went on to attend SUNY Albany for the next four years. Her father, who migrated here from England, is a living example of hard work and persistence as he worked his way up the construction industry in New York City. Her Mother, a BOCES CTE educator for thirty years, provided the same example. Cara elected to learn barbering in BOCES in her senior year in high school with her parents’ example front and center.
“I chose barbering as my skilled trade in high school because my parents taught me that if we learned a trade, we would never go hungry. I had a huge desire to learn a profitable skill like they did.”
The summer following her graduation from Pat-Med High School, she became a NYS licensed master barber, using her first and of course her best client as a live model for the state ran test: her father. For the next four years, she not only attended SUNY Albany as a student. Cara also cut hair on campus and worked at Top Hat Barber Shop in Sayville on school breaks and vacations. The goal being to support herself through college and maintain financial stability. She went on in 2020-2021 to attend Stony Brook’s MAT Graduate Program where she graduated with dual teaching certificates in Social Studies and Career and Technical Education for grades 7-12.
Her next step on the journey and safe landing at William Floyd High School was nothing short of divine intervention though.
“While working a Saturday at Monti’s Barbershop in Moriches, I was discussing my CTE/social studies career goals with coworkers while unknowingly cutting the hair of William Floyd School District board of education Vice President, Robert Taiani. Mr. Taiani then told me that the district hadn’t filled the CTE Barbering vacancy yet and that I should contact Mr. Felicetta for an interview.”
The rest is a rolling history that is still unfolding. Line by line, student by student, and heart by heart, she’s currently been teaching the Barbering Program at the high school for nearly the past four years and couldn’t love it more.
One thing amongst the many that she loves about the CTE Program, specifically at William Floyd High School, is that it’s in-house. The students being sent out to learn at BOCES can sometimes feel impersonal, surrounded with negative stigmas and a two-tracked education experience.
“In 2012, Floyd’s CTE Department was established and the district built state-of-the-art classrooms in the High School in order to keep the CTE programs in-house and accessible – this is my absolute favorite thing about this district. This also proves that this district is willing to invest in their students’ future success.”
Like any difference maker in life, there are pivotal moments that can be both heart-breaking and heart-prompting. Moments that can often prompt the human heart to want to help other people, beyond just a career and paycheck. Cara had a childhood friend, Sean Patrick Dixon, who was diagnosed with cancer while she was away at college. Sean would come into the barbershop she worked at during summer break for a short haircut that would help disguise how thin his hair had become from the ongoing chemotherapy. The two would FaceTime while she was away at school to catch up and Sean was anticipating getting a prosthetic leg. He passed away not long thereafter in 2017, after the cancer aggressively spread beyond treatment.
“I had already been a St. Baldrick’s Volunteer at that point, but losing someone I loved after helping him during his chemo-induced hair loss was undoubtedly a pivotal moment in my life. St. Baldrick’s is the only charity that allows me to use my barbering skills to raise money and awareness for childhood cancer research so less people would experience personally the pain of losing their children. I will be involved in St. Baldricks as long as I can and each event I host with my students is in memory of Sean Patrick Dixon.”
Ms. Cliffe is using her classroom as not only a place where young people can learn a trade with the possibility of making a living. She also teaches life lessons by example that are without a price tag. The value of showing up for someone, helping others, being kind and generous while not forgetting where you come from and who helped you up along the way. She works alongside other charities like Jason Alexander of “Shaheem Blue the Barber363” Foundation who has donated full barbering kits and monetary awards to former students and plans on continuing each year. She has assisted in forming a partnership with William Floyd’s Naval Junior Reserve Officer Training Corps (NJROTC) program where junior cadets come into her classroom to receive haircuts from her students. Many friendships and bonds have been formed around those haircuts, as instilling good public relation skills is also something she values and teaches. Ms. Cliffe has embedded community service and helping other humans into her classroom and curriculum, as she reflects on another pivotal moment that helped stir these attributes into her heart and everyday actions.
“When I was accepted to BOCES in high school, the cost of my equipment was over $600 and I couldn’t afford it. But my parents made a deal with me: if I promised to complete the CTE Barbering program and schedule my license exam at the end, (regardless of how good I was), they would pay for my tools so I could attend. Knowing that my parents invested in me made me work harder because not only would I be letting them down, but I would also be going back on my word. I never could’ve predicted that their confidence in me would carry me this far. I want to offer that to my students who don’t have support at home.”
Cara is known around Floyd for going the extra mile for her students. She makes it a point to show up for them, knows how to relate to the next generation and believes firmly in investing in young lives, just as her parents and others along the journey have done for her. She’s often sitting at her students’ sports events and extracurricular school activities where she’s proudly posting highlight clips on William Floyd Barbering Instagram page. She watches many teenage boys enter her classroom in the eleventh grade, knowing nothing about barbering initially. Less than two years later, she gets to witness them walking across the stage to receive their diploma as confident young men, many of whom are going on to a career in the trade she teaches in her classroom. She still keeps in touch with many former students, some of whom are working successfully in the barbering field. She receives photos of haircuts with such creative and intricate designs and couldn’t be prouder of her “kids,” their hard work, progress and success despite many odds they may face.
“Teaching students from low socioeconomic backgrounds puts things into perspective because one of their main focuses is how they will ever become financially stable or find a job to pay their bills. With this trade these kids can work anywhere in the world cutting hair, regardless of language barriers,” proudly states Ms. Cliffe.
As for the future vision of this program. Cara would love to see more female students like herself pursue this trade. She’d also love to see a NYS license testing site brought closer or into William Floyd. The only current site is currently in Hicksville. She’s working on a new segment called “Undefined,” which are short interviews with individuals within our district to highlight how much diversity of talent is within our community. Her goal is to eventually get her students to conduct the entire interview with her simply behind the camera. When she retires in the future, she’d love to pass on the program to a former student who will then teach the next generation of barbers in New York State.
“That’s the ultimate goal for this specific program.”
Thank you, Ms. Cliffe, for everything you’ve done and are doing to make our district, our community and ultimately to make our world a better place to be.
