A few years ago, we installed NTN (New Technology Network), a personalized system of learning opportunities that is designed to meet the varying needs of our students.

As Point Arena High School senior Leif Rasmusen recently told the school’s Site Council, “The NTN project process is starting to make more sense.”

Student motivation is strong. Every PAHS student has chosen a project. Their NTN advisors, who are PAHS teachers, check in with them daily, and most students have a one-on-one community mentor. We need more volunteers, and EduAct is helping.

All projects are in start-up mode right now. This is our first stab at this. Students are choosing goals, listing information they’ll need to learn to complete their projects, making timelines, doing research, and writing in their journals daily.

Semester grades will be based on their journal entries, weekly progress, mentor evaluation, a written paper, and an end-of-semester presentation.

Our PAHS Art Teacher, Shanna Lee (slee@pauhs.org), tells me we’re really well organized for our first steps. She believes the students are beginning to get the NTN project vision. They’re seeing their projects as student-centered. Many are seeing this class period as a time where they can incorporate academics into their personal interests and goals.

In the future, I plan to introduce the community to many of these projects. Here are a few for now.

PAHS Art teacher, Shanna Lee

with senior Reyna Benitez

Project: Create a book of her photographs

Reyna will include samples of the different techniques she hopes to learn this semester, including long exposures, motion blurs, silhouettes, and/or portraits.

Mentor: Shanna Lee, PAHS art teacher

Next step: Learn to use the exposure settings on the school’s camera

PAHS Senior Leif Rasmusen

Project: Record a music album with limited resources

Leif’s band, Gioia Armata, (Armed Joy), will record a cassette, using PAHS’s almost-antique four-track tape cassette player and microphones. Two fellow band members, August Riehl and Sam Graham, make up the NTN project team.

Mentor: Jake Skillman, a studio engineer, who once had his own band

Need: Microphones

Senior, Ashlynn Okubu

Project: Research herbal preparations for a future career in Ayurvedic medicine

Ashlynn will produce her own herbal teas, tinctures, extracts, and salves, along with researching pathways to becoming an Ayurvedic doctor.

Mentor: Jacqueline Strock, co-owner, Roots Herbal Apothecary, Point Arena

Next step: Begin production with her mentor

Senior James Ritchie, Instructor

Bill Stockton, Senior Frank Terlouw.

(Not shown: Senior Shawn VanCleave.)

Project: Rebuild a go-cart

Last year, a badly damaged go-cart was found in a garbage can. This team plans to use it to learn design, welding, framing, and more.

Mentor: Bill Stockton, retired PAHS Maintenance Manager

Need: An 18hp motor

Next steps: Learn to draw to scale

Freshmen, Erick Torres, Cesar Coria

Project: Develop a map of Point Arena using the Minecraft.edu computer program

Cesar has built small towns with Minecraft, and Erik has built structures with Lego’s. This larger project, when finished, may be uploaded to a public site. “Not the regular way to get a grade,” said Cesar.

Mentor: John Miller, creator of the educational version of Mindcraft; referred by PAHS teacher Thomas Cee (their NTN advisor)

Next step: Find a second computer

Freshmen, Elijah Fisher and Ethan Harbuck

Project: Research, design, and build a Zen garden

Discussion with school administration has begun to possibly build the Zen garden on PAHS grounds.

Need: Find a mentor

Next step: Show Mr. Cee (their NTN advisor) their Zen garden design

Freshmen, Orlando Sanchez and

Alejandro (Bean) Velasquez

Project: Short term, the team plans to find financing to improve the school soccer team’s equipment. The team has applied for a grant from Dick’s Sporting Goods. Long term, they want to explore the feasibility of developing a combo-field, baseball and soccer, on the existing football field, which is now home to 1,000 gophers. The existing soccer field, located beyond the baseball field, is also gopher infested and slants significantly downward.

Need: A mentor who knows construction and can read blueprints

Next step: Find soccer equipment for the school’s soccer team, which made the Division 3 playoffs last year.

Freshman, Tule Moreno

Project: Learn to read notes

When Tule was nine-years old, she saw the movie, “If I Stay,” about a teenager named Mia who, though her life was filled with tragedy, learns to play the cello.

Mentor: Thomas Cee, her NTN advisor, who is teaching her how to read notes

Next step: Learn to read notes and play them on her cello