School to School Service nets Basketball Backboards and Experience

Schools across Oconee County have a variety of nontraditional needs not normally covered in the budgetary process and the students at the Hamilton Career Center (HCC) need to receive real-world experience in addition to the excellent instruction they receive on a day-to-day basis. Recently, those two sets of needs met quite nicely at Seneca Middle School in the form of new basketball backboards for the school’s outdoor recreation areas. Some weeks ago, Dawson Alexander, HCC’s carpentry instructor was contacted by Seneca Middle Assistant Principal Michael Hamilton about taking on the project of creating replacements for the aged and deteriorating backboards located both behind the school and in one of the parking lots. Alexander and three of his carpentry students eagerly embraced the project and spent many hours taking a raw idea and developing it into a finished product. As Alexander explained, “We like to have our classes take on a variety of different service projects which helps the students gain much needed experience.” In fact, for this project, the students, high school seniors Lucas Teti and Ethan Black from West-Oak High and Osiel Rodriguez from Walhalla High, gained a variety of experience as they saw the project from start to finish. They started with raw plywood and utilized a wide range of skills from measurement and design, to woodworking, fiberglassing and painting to turn out a professional looking product incorporating artwork designed by Seneca Middle School art teacher, Robert Spencer. Hamilton stated, “I am not only pleased with the final product but also by the professionalism and attention to detail exhibited by the students. They even went so far as to paint the bolt heads to match the backboard background color. We are thrilled by their work, which will be in use and on display for many years to come.”