Community Tool School
By Andrew Stevens
As quarantine comes to a close for most, the University of North Carolina at Asheville’s STEAM Studio plans to reopen its summer SkillSet workshops during July. These weeklong summer camps see girls and nonbinary students in middle and high school guided by professional artists, engineers and creators in the use of woodworking and metal fabrication equipment. Each week of the camp provides a different activity, with the students learning how to build a variety of projects ranging from wind chimes to a working electric guitar. Along with allowing these students access to professional tools such as laser cutters and 3D modeling equipment, the workshops are designed to provide them with cooperation skills, a design mindset and a valuable sense of completion. Classes for ages 11 to 18 will be held weekly beginning July 5.
“The students get some confidence in the sense that they can see a project through to completion,” says Jeannie Regan, SkillSet program director. “They can do something that’s difficult. For us, that is probably the big takeaway: developing resilience by doing difficult things.”
Along with these lifelong skills and experiences, the workshops give the students a custom creation to take home. The projects the students create are designed not only to be displayed but to be functional. The lamps come ready to light, the wind chimes pre-tuned and the guitars amp-ready. While the summer camps are tailored to girls and non-binary students who have, according to Regan, historically been barred from these workshop spaces, diversity and accessibility are the most important parts of the job.
“We would never turn away a boy who wanted to enroll; they would just have to understand what kind of environment they were walking into,” says Regan. “And we do offer pretty amazing financial aid. We’re not means-testing people; people pay what they can afford to come to our classes.”
In the same way that the students grow through the program, the program has the potential to grow through the students. Andie Jones is a student who has participated in multiple SkillSet workshops and will take part in the guitar camp this summer. Along with being a camper, Jones helped Regan create and instruct Stop Motion Commotion, an online stop motion animation class, and designed the SkillSet’s logo.
“They have a great community; everyone is so wonderful,” says Jones. “It’s so empowering to have these ladies that are so skilled at what they do. It’s a lot of fun to be with other girls when there’s not any pressure to act a certain way. You just get to be yourself and make fun stuff.”
Go to SkillSet.tools/summer-2021 to learn more about each week-long event, or email jregan@unca.edu for enrollment information.
