Even though school was out, the Whitmer Career and Technology Center buzzed with activity on Wednesday and Thursday last week.
It was the site of the annual technology summer camp that normally is held for students entering fifth, sixth, and seventh grades. The event was so popular this year that seventh graders had to be excluded, according to Kim Dedo, the center's associate principal, who said attendance, at 229, was more than double last year's even without them.
"The whole idea is to expose these young kids to what they might like to do, what careers are open to them," Ms. Dedo said.
The camp focused on 10 areas: automotive technology, computer networking, construction technology, cosmetology, culinary arts, digital graphic design, engineering, law and order, medical technology/biomedical science, and teaching. Camp participants attended two sessions a day.
The vocational training at Whitmer emphasizes the need for higher education, at a two or four-year college, in these fields, Ms. Dedo said. One career center graduate in cosmetology will attend the University of Toledo in the fall and will pay his way through school by working in that field.
One of the most heavily subscribed camp sessions was culinary arts, which sent the students into the career center's kitchen to learn about food and its preparation.
Chef Michael DuShane, the instructor, demonstrated how to make empanadas, which was fine with Macy Bartko, 11, who will be in the sixth grade next year.
Macy said she enjoyed cooking with her mother and looked forward to helping her even more in the kitchen.
Another popular session was engineering, where teacher Reis Baidel had a sledge hammer suspended head down so it could swing like a pendulum.
He used it to demonstrate the damage that blows can cause to a person or object. The students' assignment was to put a clay pigeon inside a styrene-foam container and come up with a way to insulate it from a hammer blow.
Jacob Mann and Wesley Redmond, both 12, taped padding around the container and watched as Mr. Baidel swung the hammer into it, knocking it across the room. The clay pigeon, upon examination, was intact.
Jacob and Wesley said they were delighted by their success. Their inspiration, they said, was a football helmet.
In the digital graphic design session, students sat at Macs and deftly used Adobe Photoshop to crop and add details to photographs.
Teacher Brian Anderson said most of them already had experience. "They signed up because they're interested in visual art," he explained.
Kaylee West, 10, said she was enjoying herself as she worked on a photo of herself and a friend.
"I don't want to leave here," she said.
Contact Carl Ryan at: carlryan@theblade.com or 419-724-6050.
First Published June 15, 2011, 4:45 a.m.