By Sue Moore
A former Tobey Tiger has been superintendent of schools for Morrisville-Eaton Central in upstate New York for the past 10 years. He recently won the Melvin Jones Award, the highest honor a Lion can receive, from his home club.
“Mike has given heart and soul to our community and that is why we presented him with the award,” said members of the Morrisville Lions Club. His proud parents, Bob and Nancy Drahos, who live in a home on Sprinkle Road, remember when young Mike was a dedicated band member of the Big Red Machine under Jim Shaw’s tutelage. He participated in the Showboat in 1973 as a trombonist when they performed “76 Trombones” on stage. Drahos graduated from Hope College, then went to Colgate for his master’s degree. Although he never took any education courses as an undergraduate, he had an epiphany he says, when he was serving as an intern in Congressman Garry Brown’s office, deciding to teach government as a career.
“Everyone knows Drahos as superintendent because he is always at school – at every sporting event, every concert, every meeting. His activity with Operation Southern Comfort was with a project to rebuild New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina. He took ten trips, involving over 100 different students from his school to help rebuild the area. Now he and many Morrisville-Eaton students work with Operation Northern Comfort and other community projects,” his local newspaper the Mid York Weekly, reported. Only two such awards were given by the club in the last ten years, they said. Mike is retiring after 22 years as a social studies teacher and 16 years as a school administrator.