On a recent Friday afternoon, when most high-schoolers were busy making weekend plans, 17-year-old Darius Cheung was welding his fourth metal stool.
The stool he was working on March 6 was not only the fourth stool he had welded in his life, but also the fourth stool he rehabilitated in an effort to help save the South Colonie Central School District money.
According to Barry Witte, engineering technology teacher at Colonie Central High School, for at least the past 13 years, as long as Witte has been teaching at the school, the technology department has offered students the opportunity to learn about welding while completing small fix-it jobs on furniture used throughout the school’s classrooms. The furniture includes metal stools, chairs and chair-desks.
Witte said after looking through a catalog at the costs of the things the students fix in the district, he found that the stools typically run between $70 and $80; the chairs cost roughly $100; and the chair-desk combo can cost up to $500.
A couple dozen break in a year, so that adds up to several thousand dollars, said Witte.
Instead of simply replacing the furniture, the technology teacher sees the broken equipment as an opportunity to create a learning experience for students.
Witte said the night custodians check the furniture in the classrooms every night when they are cleaning the rooms. The chairs and stools that wobble or teeter, or maybe are just completely broken, are brought to the technology room for Witte to see.
Witte then asks students if they would like to volunteer to stay after school and complete the welding projects to restore the furniture.
This year, so far, Cheung was Witte’s only volunteer.
When asked why he thinks his classmates did not want to volunteer to weld after school, Cheung said they were probably just too lazy to come in. Cheung, a junior, said that he decided to come in because, `I wanted to learn how to weld,` he said.
According to Cheung, the process for welding the furniture was fairly simple: Witte would point out what needed to be fixed on the furniture, demonstrate how to weld by welding a piece of furniture himself and then stand by and watch as Cheung welded the furniture himself. Since the high school does not have a formal welding class, Witte teaches the students who are welding as they go through it.
The entire welding `lesson` begins with Witte teaching the student who is welding about the safety gear, and how it is needed to protect the students from the bright light of the welding. Once the safety gear was on, Cheung said it took him about 15 minutes to weld each stool.
While Witte said the school has let students complete the welding projects for a number of years, this year is very different.
`I just look at it as, these are tight fiscal times that we’re in and with this, the school is able to spend money on other things,` Witte said.
Principal David Wetzel said, `We’re always looking for ways to save the district money. We live in a disposable society. People just throw things away and buy them new.`
Wetzel said that he is glad that the students can refurbish the furniture and actually learn something while saving the district money.
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