The end of the school year means another instalment of Rocky Views Schools’ (RVS) Building Futures program has come to a close, and students, staff and supervising tradespeople celebrated the wrap-up with an outdoor pizza party on June 25.
Building Futures is an alternative learning program run by RVS where students in Grade 10 leave their traditional classrooms for a year to assist with hands-on construction projects in the community while concurrently taking their core courses. Students alternate between classroom time and hands-on work, learning from two teachers in a repurposed garage setting.
Teacher Coleman Massey, who has been with RVS for seven years and just wrapped up his second year with Building Futures, said his favourite part about the program is the learning flexibility that comes with it.
“We have a cohort of students and we get to help them design their learning experience – it’s more than just building a house,” he said.
“We introduce personal interest courses and build things within the Alberta Education framework that you maybe couldn’t do in a traditional school setting.”
This year, students had the opportunity to aid in the construction of a house in Airdrie’s Bayside community in partnership with McKee Homes, as well as build shelters and habitats for animals at the Alberta Pound and Rescue Centre’s (APARC) Airdrie-based warehouse.
Even though the program was put on hold at times due to the evolving restrictions surrounding the COVID-19 pandemic this school year, Building Futures student Kiera Macdonald said the experience is one she would “without a doubt” recommend to everyone.
“The people have made it such an amazing experience, they’re all so nice and people I’ll remember for the rest of my life. They’ve really made my year,” she said.
Long-time Building Futures supervising teacher Laura Burt said that regardless of whether or not COVID-19 is involved, students in Building Futures are able to control the direction of the program and that “they get out of it what they put into it.”
Andrew Fallow, also a student, said the close cohort of 22 students and two teachers was really valuable to him – especially in a year of teetering education regulations.
“It feels like the teachers are more accessible to you,” he said, adding the relationships he was able to build with his classmates and teachers were closer than they would have been in a traditional school setting.
Burt reiterated the kind of opportunities and relationships that present themselves to Building Futures students are different than a regular school.
“I love the learning curve aspect of it,” she said.
The program is coming back in the upcoming school year, but with a few changes to previous years.
For the first time, Massey said applications were opened to students entering Grade 11, in addition to students entering Grade 10.
According to the RVS Community Learning Centre website, the program is open to all types of learners from across the public school division, but students who are self-directed, not afraid to take risks, good at thinking outside the box and looking for a different learning experience tend to thrive most in Building Futures.
