Shooting program takes off in city school

Shooting program takes off in city school – In the bowels of Charlotte High School, around the corner from the boiler room and directly beneath the swimming pool, shots ring out. It is hot, humid and noisy. Four young men are prone and propped up on their backpacks with Olympic-grade Daisy single-shot air rifles pointed down-range. Master Sgt. Shawn Legault paces behind them. The boys, students at Leadership Academy for Young Men, are part of one of the few marksmanship programs in a public high school, and certainly the only one in Monroe County. “I believe this is character-building,” said Master Sgt. Eric Meister, who directs the program along with Legault as part of Leadership Academy’s JROTC program. “And that’s our mission, to build better citizens.”