Career center decks halls with unique trees

The Barnwell County Career Center decked the halls with creative Christmas trees made by students in each course from materials found in their classrooms.

“The task was to use whatever was in the class. It took us about a day and half to figure out what we’re going to use,” said Dorian Sanders, a first-year student in the mechatronics class.

Each tree is unique to the classroom it sits outside of. The cosmetology class crafted a tree using hair curlers and blow dryers, criminal justice students depicted a Christmas crime, and the mechatronics class made an electrifying display.

“We used conduit for the trunk of the tree, and we used a metal box for the bottom, a breaker panel I reckon,” said Sanders. “We used conduit for the branches and spray painted them green, and we used breakers, light switches, outlets, light switch covers and boxes.”

“I think our tree is pretty good,” said third-year mechatronics student Alan Villalobos. “I feel like we were probably the most creative.”

“Critical thinking went into it, a lot,” said Sanders of the mechatronics tree.

At the entrance to the school sits the spiraling tree made by the building construction class.

“We made our tree out of random wood we found around the shop,” said Antonio Washington, a building construction student. “We made the base of the board out of 2x4s, and for the ornaments we cut down a branch of an oak tree.”

Each disc of oak has the initials of its creator burned onto either side. This theme was consistent in some of the trees as the welding class also had their initials on handmade ornaments.

“They used the products they’d normally be dealing with, like welding made their tree out of all metal and cut out their own ornaments,” said BCCC Director David Augustine.

The building construction students did not decide on this style of tree right in the beginning, according to Washington they toyed around with some other ideas as well.

“We were going to do a random pole and try to make branches off of it, but we came up with this idea, so we just went with it,” said Washington.

The mechatronics class also had some other ideas before landing on their final project.

“We were going to get a motor and wire it up to spin it, but we didn’t have a motor small enough,” said Sanders. The students were also planning to wrap elements of the tree in electrical tape, according to Villalobos.

The health and science students relied on an old friend to bring their tree to fruition. Herman the skeleton was used as the centerpiece of their Christmas decor.

“We decided to do Herman because he was the only thing we had to prop up,” said Vivian Sheppard, a first-year health science student. “We kind of propped his body up and put clear tubing and blew up balloons and used various ornaments.”

The star atop Herman’s head is made of medical vials, and his wrapped ribcage is decorated with angels made of masks and blown-up surgical gloves.

Unlike some of the other classes, Herman was always the plan for the health science class.

“I wasn't surprised [with the level of creativity] because we have such great students, but just to see some of the ideas was just cool to see,” said Augustine.

These Christmas trees were crafted in roughly a week and a half, and Augustine is impressed with how quickly BCCC students were able to get creative.

The idea started when the building construction class reached out to him wanting to do something festive for the upcoming holidays. Augustine readily agreed and suggested that it be expanded to the whole school.

Selected teachers voted on which trees are the most creative and best used classroom materials.

First place was the building construction class and Herman the skeleton placed second in Dawn Wilbanks’ Health and Science class.

These sorts of innovative projects are one of the reasons students enjoy learning at BCCC as they further interest in their future career or current job.

“This class helps with my job, I’m an apprentice at Swiss Krono and I’m doing maintenance, so mechatronics helps a lot with that,” said Sanders.

“I’m a third-year student with mechatronics, and I’m considering getting an actual career in the field,” said Villalobos.

“This is my first year, and it’s pretty cool. I like it,” said Sheppard. “I want to be an ultrasound tech; I want to share those happy moments with families when they get to see their babies.”