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Building Buddies program has students' future in mind

High school, elementary school students partner up in shop classes
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Peter Skene Ogden Secondary School student Shelby Olsen

Hammerheads, Gearheads and Metalheads came together for a fun day of educational activities at Peter Skene Ogden Secondary School in 100 Mile House on June 3.

Local high school students partnered with Grade 5 students from 100 Mile House Elementary School in a program called “Building Buddies,” designed to expose elementary school students to potential trades they might be interested in and create relationships between the older and younger students.

Close to 60 students in three groups saw tool demonstrations and completed projects together in the automotive, metal and wood shops.

Building Buddies is about “taking away the fears and giving students more potential excitement for what's ahead,” says David Corbett, School District No. 27's (SD27) co-ordinator of career programs.

“It's such a great opportunity for kids, working with their hands, seeing mechanical tools, building things.”

For the smaller students, the program is also an opportunity to see and understand “the bigger school” and the change that's going to happen down the road, Corbett adds.

SD27 hopes to get other schools from the area involved in the coming years, he notes.

“We want to give them a lot of potential [options], a lot of vision for what the future looks like.”