Student Chris Hamm working on one of the oven models - and he's available for hire!
We had a chance today to go and visit with the masonry students and their amazing teacher, Mr. Bruce Hayden, at the Southside Technical High School off of Harrodsburg Rd. For those of you unfamiliar with the program, the students who attend the program are mostly Juniors or Seniors in Fayette County public high schools (or the surrounding counties). They arrange their schedules so that they attend their district high school for half of the day and spend the other half at Southside working on their selected major.
We had the great opportunity to connect with these students this past summer when Seedleaf proposed the idea of building a Community Pizza Oven for the London Ferrell Community Garden. Once built, the oven hopefully will serve as a natural gathering spot in the garden, a place around which community members can circle, share stories, and enjoy fresh hot pizza out of the oven, topped of course with fresh veggies from the garden!
When it became clear that Seedleaf didn’t have the expertise to build such a structure, we reached out the community and were delighted to find Mr. Hayden at Southside. They generously agreed to take on the project as one of their community-focused initiatives, and were even brave enough to try and work with our hastily- drawn sketches for the oven.
This afternoon was our first opportunity to go to the school and see the model ovens for ourselves, and we were more than impressed. The students there have been working hard, under the great tutelage of Mr. Hayden, at crafting NUMEROUS life-sized models of the ovens. So many options to consider, and each of them constructed by students learning the craft.
While are mouths are already watering at the thought of the tasty pies that will one day come out of the oven, today was truly had an opportunity to be grateful for the excessive generosity of the Southside students. We are reminded again about the wonderful assets that our community already has, and we only hope that we can serve to deliver adequate praise and thanks to this super program.
Note: The masonry students are also available for hire for miscellaneous projects that you might have. Not only do you feel good about providing an opportunity for students to get more hands-on job training, but these hard-working students can develop a true sense of worth to recognize the value of their developing expertise. Contact Mr. Bruce Hayden at (859) 381-3603 to find out more information.
