Skills Work - At Camp!

Humber College, North Campus

Hi!  Tyrone here, still recovering from my first week at camp!  Last week, I checked out the camp at Humber College in Toronto.  It was amazing!  Humber offers training in so many different trades and technologies, and some of the professors actually volunteered their time to teach us a bit about their areas of expertise.  We did so many workshops and activities, and even went offsite for a day.  What a great week!

Our first workshop was all about HVAC – that’s heating, ventilation and air conditioning.  We got to use welding torches – awesome!!  We also did an activity with electrical currents, hooking up an electrical circuit.  Our workshop leader was Mary, who teaches HVAC at Humber.  I found out afterward that Mary has also been a mentor with the “Skills Work!^® for Women” Networking Dinner program and a judge for the Cardboard Boat Races!  Anyway, nobody told me I was going to get to play with torches this week.  I’m always the last to know everything!

On Wednesday, we did an electrical workshop – all about pipes.  I didn’t know pipes were used so much in electrical work, but they’re often used to insulate wires, protect them from being touched or bumped, or even just to bunch them together so everything looks neat.  We bent those plastic and metal pipes into all different shapes with fancy tools and our big muscles!  (Okay, the heat and tools helped…so did our leaders.)  This time, our workshop leader was Tony and he was really nice.  I bet he’s good at electrical stuff.

Our off-site trip for the week was to a place called Build-It-Yourself Learning Centre.  It was a huge workshop and classroom and we made birdhouses, right from scratch!  Our teacher was Ian, and taught us so much stuff!  He taught us how to use all the tools – hammers, saws and measuring tapes, and about safety in the workshop.  He even talked about how we can become carpenters someday.  I’m not sure I want to be a carpenter, but my birdhouse is pretty sweet and I don’t think I’ll ever get tired of showing it off!

On Friday, we got to do some cooking!  My mom was really excited when she found out I would be learning how to cook something.  She’s been trying to get me to do that for ages!  After this workshop, I just might be more willing to volunteer.  I mean, come on.  We made pizza!  And it was amazing!  Chef Trevor really knows his stuff!  Before we got started, he taught us a bit about induction stoves.  An induction stove only heats the pot or pan, and the pot or pan heats the food.  One of our leaders, April, actually gave Chef Trevor a fifty dollar bill to put under a pot of water because he said it wouldn’t burn. He was right, but I can’t believe she trusted him!  Fifty bucks!!  Anyway, then we split into pairs and made pizza.  My favourite part was eating it.  I’m a pretty good pizza-maker, if I do say so myself!

What an awesome, awesome week.  I can’t wait to see what the next camp has in store for me!!