Anchorage Daily News

In Zion Russell's fourth-period class, students don't sit quietly behind desks. They don't take notes. And they don't read a lot of textbooks and memorize a lot of facts.

Instead, Russell's engineering students at Dimond High walk around, chatter and occasionally get their hands wet or handle X-Acto knives. It's a hands-on way of learning that characterizes much of the new Dimond Engineering Academy's course work -- and it is attracting attention as an alternative way to engage kids, especially teenage boys.

"This is the only class this year that I haven't fallen asleep in," said 15-year-old Keenan Roettger, barely looking up from adjusting a 3-foot-long hydraulic arm he was building in Russell's class recently.

Dimond is the first school in the Anchorage School District to have an engineering academy. This year, 120 students chose one of its year-long elective courses.

"A lot of students say, 'I want to be an engineer,' " said teacher Jennifer Childress. "With this, they really have an idea."

The academy grew out of an already strong science program at the South Anchorage school and the popularity of its after-school robotics club that calls itself "Nerds of the North." With grants from local businesses, the curriculum follows Project Lead The Way, a national program around for more than a decade and aimed at training more engineers. Alaska, for years, hasn't been producing enough engineers to meet local demand.

The academy has proven to be so popular that a group of sophomores who couldn't schedule a course into their normal school day have chosen to extend their school day in order to participate.

"It's rigorous. But they love it," said the district's head of high schools, Mike Henry.

In Anchorage public schools, where one in five students drops out of high school, the academy also answers the call for a different kind of teaching that engages kids, administrators say. Experts say hands-on learning is especially helpful for boys, who tend to drop out more than girls.

Boys make up the vast majority of the kids who chose to take academy classes. In Russell's fourth period class, for example, 18 of the 20 students are male.

Hunter Bullard, a 17-year-old junior in an upper-level course, said he likes staying busy.

"It makes it so much easier to learn things when it's hands on," Bullard said. "When you are sitting here behind a desk with your face drooling on the desk, it's really, really, really hard to learn."

"The digital electronics class flies. I wish it was longer," he said.

Russell, a science teacher, says the curriculum is good for any kid who can't sit still.

"Everyone learns in a different way," he said. "There are people who learn auditorially, visually, there's musical intelligence ... There are all these different types of intelligence."

Some students, he said, need to learn by doing, by interacting and by moving. So he coaches more and lectures less.

Students work in groups. Students discover key concepts on their own. And he assures them that mistakes are a natural part of learning.

"When they come into this class, it's, 'Hey, we're building something. It's like Legos when I was a kid. I love Legos.'

"It's something that they really look forward to, and because of that, I think they really take ownership of it, they really take control," he said.

Even for the kids who don't end up becoming engineers, teachers say there's value in learning teamwork, communication and problem-solving.

In its first year, the course has attracted mostly kids who were already college-bound, and some who were already thinking about careers in engineering, administrators say. There are a few, though, who hadn't considered college until the academy.

Russell said one teen who was on the vocational technical path, probably towards car mechanics, has since switched to a college prep track after learning he could still work with his hands but make more money doing it as a mechanical engineer.

Roettger, who's not sure what he wants to do when he grows up, said he had no choice but to take the class. "I took this class because my dad forced me," he said.

Then he looked up from trying to cut a wooden dowel with an X-Acto knife: "It's the first time he's been right."

Find Megan Holland online at adn.com/contact/mholland or call 257-4343.

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