When: May 10th

Time: 4:00-6:00pm

Where: Silver Springs Wood Shop 140 Park Avenue Grass Valley, CA

Everybody loves a bargain, and what could be a better bargain than buying moderately priced handcrafted home decor and helping local at-risk youth? On May 10th from 4:00 to 6:00 PM the public will have an opportunity to buy handcrafted wood products made from recycled wood at a showcase and sale held by the Silver Springs High School woodshop. The showcase at the school on School Alley off South Auburn St. in Grass Valley offers a win for everybody. Buyers get beautiful wood items, and students develop valuable life skills, including craft skills, business knowledge, and a strong work ethic.

The public is invited to support the program by buying items at the sale or by donating used wood for future projects. For more information about the event or to donate, call Mike Pettengill at 272-2635 Ext: 327.

Buy Home Decor, Support Local Students

Mr. Mike Pettengill, the Silver Springs Woodshop teacher, uses a unique approach to teaching woodshop classes. Pettengill grew up in his father’s handmade furniture business and later became an architectural design and woodshop teacher. Out of his experiences, he created a woodshop class that brings a real world business approach into the classroom. He says, “The premise is not to do the traditional woodshop but to make and sell products that consumers can use.”

Pettengill works with local businesses to produce items that they can sell in their stores. For one local business, his student crew created butcher block cutting boards. For a wine business, they turned wine barrels into glass racks, tables, and accessories. For yet another in the olive oil business, the class used rounds of raw olive wood to make gorgeous hand-rubbed gift boxes to hold bottles of fine olive oil.

Using all recycled wood and an eco-conscious approach, Pettengill runs the program without buying materials. The students reclaim wood from pallets and other castoff wood sources and turn it into clever products, such as Adirondack chairs, candle holders, wind chimes, planter boxes, and more. Pettengill notes that creativity is a big part of what they do together: “I work more like a foreman and mentor of a crew than as a teacher. The students come up with the ideas as a team.”

The program’s innovative curriculum stems not only from Pettengill’s creativity but also from the three-way partnership between the school district, the local One-Stop Business and Career Center, and Sierra Commons, a local non-profit supporter of startup businesses. Together, they have designed a unique program tailored to the needs of this particular student group.

The One-Stop, through its parent organization, the Nortec Workforce Investment Board, provides partial funding for the program. Nicola Murphy, the Career Development Consultant who manages the One-Stop Youth Program, works closely with students to help them improve attendance and productivity and to reach graduation goals. According to Pettengill, “Nicola Murphy has put in lots of hours counseling and helping students with job preparedness. She has been a wonderful asset to our program.”

To build his students’ business knowledge, Pettengill partners with Sierra Commons, a local nonprofit supporter of startup businesses. Robert Trent, Executive Director of Sierra Commons, teaches the students how to operate their wood products business, covering topics in Mission and Vision, Marketing, Branding, Finance, Operations, Value Proposition, and Target Markets.

Trent sees the collaboration as an excellent opportunity for the students to learn how a real business works from initial planning through daily operation. According to Trent, “The woodshop students really shine. They seem to be in their element when they are designing and manufacturing products. They are building a solid foundation for what it means to be an entrepreneur and what it takes to run a business.”

Pettengill and his partners modeled the program after The Bicycle Recycle Project at Seven Hills School in Nevada City, which has trained more than 1500 students to rebuild used bicycles. They hope to replicate the exceptional success of that program and train a new generation of successful craft business people.

Seeing the students work and talking to them about the program makes clear how much they enjoy and appreciate what they are learning. Dakota Scarbrough, one of the newer students in the class, says, “The class helps me learn to concentrate and follow a project all the way through to completion.” He also mentioned how much he likes the teamwork and looks forward to ending his day with woodshop. “I’m proud of my chair,” he says. “We put some of it together as a team, and the finish work is mine; I’m gonna make it look good.

Another student, Chris Nix, has been part of the team since January, creating a variety of products, including wind chimes, wine racks, and tables. He says, “I like the idea that we’re recycling. We can take anything that might be thrown away and make good stuff. I like that we can come up with our own designs and use our imagination.” Nix further shared, “My goal in life is to have my own auto shop, so learning how to run a business will help me in the future.”

The public is invited to support the program by buying items at the sale or by donating used wood for future projects. For more information about the event or to donate, call Mike Pettengill at 272-2635 Ext: 327.