Faculty and Staff Spotlight Teacher Found the Recipe for Success at BOCES

SCHOHARIE – He once founded and ran for more than a decade The Placid Baker in Troy, but it wasn’t until he became a teacher at Capital Region BOCES that he found the recipe for success is in sharing your knowledge.

Chris Snye is in his fourth year of teaching Culinary Arts and Hospitality Technology at the Capital Region BOCES Career and Technical Education Center – Schoharie Campus.

“Being able to pass on skills and techniques to the next generation of culinary professionals is extremely rewarding,” he said.

The chef and entrepreneur started teaching at BOCES after working for a couple of years as Farm to School Coordinator/Culinary Manager in the Capital Region BOCES Shared Food Service Department. Prior to that he founded and operated The Placid Baker and worked as a chef  in a number of Adirondack restaurants and a ski resort in Utah. He also worked as a cheesemaker on a small dairy farm making small batch farmstead cheeses. 

His first entry into the world of education was as a teaching assistant at Questar III,  “working with a friend/chef that I had worked with in Lake Placid. I realized that education should be the next step in my career.”

Snye said he finds guiding aspiring chefs and bakers to be refreshing.

“I enjoy working with the students to navigate their various needs and making them successful no matter their skill level,” Snye said. “It’s very rewarding to see them be successful whether their accomplishments are big or small.”

When not sharing his skills with students, Snye said he will occasionally cook private dinners in the summer for a family in the Adirondacks at their great camp.