Uncharted waters: Boat-building project launches students on course to personal success

SOUTH PORTLAND — At the Compass Project workshop on Anderson Street in Portland, students from the alternative education class at South Portland High School clustered around the sailboat they’re building, while senior Zach DiRenzo leaned over a workbench off to one side.

For the past hour, he’d been working one-on-one with Compass volunteer Jon Bickford to shape pieces of ribbing. Now, as the time came to start making cuts, the mentoring session turned into an impromptu lesson on fractions.

Bickford, 23, a recent graduate of the University of Maryland, has a background in carpentry, and he patiently walked DiRenzo through the necessary calculations. It only took a little prompting before the heavily tattooed 18-year-old offered up the right number, along with an explanation of how he figured it out.

Asked what he’s learning – Compass’ goal, after all, is to bring science, technology, engineering and math training to students who may be at risk of failure in the conventional classroom ­– DiRenzo couldn’t suppress a sly grin.

“Survival skills,” he said, “in case we have a zombie apocalypse.”

But DiRenzo is quick with an apologetic, only-kidding smile. The boat-building project is more than an excuse to get out of school for the afternoon, he said. It’s a way to learn practical skills that, for whatever reason, just don’t seem to stick in the usual theoretical setting. And the project, which is in its second year, has been so successful at putting at-risk students back on track that it is being extended to another alternative education class in South Portland.

“Personally, hands-on is way easier,” DiRenzo said. “When you have something to actually do, and someone to help you, it’s way easier.”

Darren Cook, one of two teachers in South Portland’s alternative education class – dubbed the One Classroom Project because it houses 22 students in grades 9-12 in a one-room, satellite building behind the high school – said if there’s one thing the Compass Project has taught him, it’s that students wind up in his room for all kinds of reasons, few of which have anything to do with an unwillingness to learn. 

Bickford agrees.

“It means a lot to me to come in and see these students work hard each day,” he said. “A lot of them come from very difficult situations, and to see them come in with their spirit and work ethic is just amazing to see. I learn as much from them on my own journey through life.”

The One Classroom Project built its first Bevin’s skiff for Compass last year. That experience was so successfully, it was extended to an additional alternative education math class. Meanwhile, Cook’s students have come back this year to build the largest boat ever attempted in the 10-year history of the Compass Project – a 17-foot-long, double-mast sailboat slated for launch in late May.

“An individual approached us interested in this particular design. Essentially, he’s commissioning the students to build it for him,” said Shane Hall, Compass Program supervisor. “So, even more than our usual project, this is very much a real-world situation.”

Compass, which joined Portland-based Spurwink Services in 2010, conducts boat-building workshops for several area high schools, including Gorham and Falmouth, in addition to South Portland.

“Schools tell us they see improved attendance among kids who participate in our program,” said Hall. “A lot of students become disinterested in school because they don’t think they’re going to succeed because they haven’t succeeded, and so they just drop out. But what we do here keeps those at-risk students engaged, on track to education and, which is our primary goal, out of the juvenile justice system.”

Cook said the One Classroom Project is a “last alternative” for students at South Portland High School. “They’ll try anything else before they send students to us,” he said.

And while many of the students have behavioral and anger issues, learning disabilities, and rough backgrounds, the common denominator is a lack of confidence. Compass, he said, gives those students a sense of accomplishment, along with a tangible product that stands – or, more correctly, floats – as proof of what they can do.

“It’s great to see them progress,” Compass shop manager Jodi Carpenter said. “I’ve worked with these kids for two years now and it’s great to see them progress. They’ve developed skills and have a lot more confidence. I’ve seen a lot of them raise to be leaders and help the kids who are new this year.”

One of the repeat builders is Travis Crager, an 18-year-old junior who ended his freshman year with zero credits.

“Without the One Classroom Project, and Compass, I probably would have dropped out,” he said, detailing a “ridiculous soap opera” home life fraught with divorce, death and depression. “With all that going on, along with trying to juggle school work and having to work 30 hours a week, it was kind of too much to handle.”

Like DiRenzo, Crager describes himself as a “hands-on learner.” Sitting through a lecture just wasn’t his thing.

“I can’t be pinned down in a classroom for five to six hours a day. I slowly go insane,” he said.

That’s why Crager has thrived in the One Classroom project, Cook said. Although it may seem counter-intuitive, the looser atmosphere, Crager said, actually helps him to focus.

“A lot of people think that kids who come to this program are druggies and scumbags,” he said. “Every once in a while, we do get a student or two look like that. But if you look around, we’re not at all like that” he said, waving across the Compass workshop, where students deemed to be disruptive and uncooperative are working together in teams toward a common goal. “We’ve all had our bumps and bruises, but everyone here is working, they’re all trying. No one’s arguing. No one’s fighting. It’s just a comfortable environment.”

Part of that, said Crager, is because of the volunteers who give their own time to assist Compass’ small staff and South Portland’s four teachers and educational technicians, all of whom are on a first-name basis with the students. Just as DiRenzo bonded with Bickford, Crager said he’s built a relationship with two older volunteers.

“They’re retired,” said Crager. “They come in on their own free time to help us out. They definitely don’t have to. So, it means a lot.”

It’s that personal touch that makes the difference, Crager said.

“It’s nice to work with people I know and can rely on,” he said. “The teachers and the volunteers care about the teachers here. A lot of the students care about the teachers and volunteers. Some students don’t like [One Classroom] because they were forced to go, but I’m doing so well in school now that I’ve been asked to go back to the regular high school, to make room here for another student.”

Asked how he feels about that, Crager is cautious.

“I don’t know,” he said, with a laugh.

Still, DiRenzo said, if he had his way, all South Portland students would get time in the Compass workshop, if not necessarily in the One Classroom building. As Cook points out, the project is about a lot more than building a boat and hoping it floats. There’s math, physics and engineering involved, as well as economics, as the students try to work through a budget.

What’s more, Cook said, the students are, in a lot of ways, actually ahead of their peers stuck in a common core rut toward post-secondary degrees. Already, they are doing what some students won’t do until they leave college – learning to work together on matters that have real consequence, because there’s a customer on the other end waiting on the finished result.

Carpenter points out that some students who have gone through the Compass program have won jobs in Maine’s boatbuilding industry, but all, said Hall, are learning lessons to last a lifetime.

“If I was hiring someone,” said Cook,” I think I’d take almost any one of these kids from the One Classroom Project over someone who’s only ever sat in a classroom.”