Technology in High School

My second year of High School presented a very different set of challenges than the first, but was still pretty rough compared to the last two, by which time I had "figured things out."  I tried out for the soccer team that fall, since that had always been my sport of choice, but had to drop out because I got really sick the week before school started.  I had done a week-long 50 Mile backpacking trip with Scouts that summer, and that pushed something out of balance in my body.  That whole year I ended up getting bloody noses on a daily basis, which was inconvenient, to say the least.

My "fun" class for the year was "Building Computers," which didn't really have much in the way of curriculum, but provided the resources to learn, by combining the most tech savvy students, in a classroom full of computer hardware to play with.  I learned more from the others in the class than I did from the teacher, and we played a lot of games as well, but once again, I know it was helpful in preparing me for where I am today.

As a random side note, the teacher from that class, who was also one of the Ski Team coaches, got indicted for sexual abuse a couple months ago, for incidents that allegedly took place around the time period that I was at school there.  I never saw any sign of that at the time, but looking back I can recognize that I was much more distant with him than I naturally would have expected to be, since we had fairly common interests (computers and skiing).  I will chalk that up to God looking out for me.

That class also prepared me to building my own computer, which I did halfway through that year.  That was the biggest expense of my life up to that point. (Although ski team was a close second from the year before)  That computer got me well situated me for my next step, which I really didn't see coming.  Colfax had a Multimedia program called Thunderpaw, which was a student run company within the school.  They produced the school clothing line, an online store, and a coffee shop at sporting events, as well as a variety of video and print projects.  While that would seem like an obvious fit for me, most of the people in the program were a bit "artsy" for my tastes, so I had no interest joining it for the first two years.

Then in April, there was an anti-drunk driving program put on at the school, called Every 15 Minutes.  They staged a car accident in the stadium, and demonstrated the entire process that took place at the scene of a major accident, to the students who were in the stands.  They continued the re-creation off property, at the hospital and morgue, as well as parents houses.  This was all filmed by the Multimedia class, edited overnight, and shown at an assembly the next day.  I was impressed with the scope of the project, and what they had been able to put off in such a short time, with the logistics that were entailed.  So that prompted me to sign up for the class my junior year, which became the dress rehearsal for what I now do for a living, as well as my primary social environment for the rest of High School.