In the first of its kind “Life Skills Day” at the Sedona Red Rock Junior High School, eighth-grader Aria Grandi took three classes out of the possible 11: Sports Readiness, How to Not be a Jerk and First-Aid.
Her favorite was the third one.
“I learned, if you see a stranger passed out on the ground, how to approach them and what to do,” she said, adding it was cool because she wants to be a physical therapist when she grows up.
The class was taught by volunteers from the American Red Cross, Rotarian and event organizer Paul Bowles said. Nearly 20 volunteers came in for the Rotary of Sedona Village-sponsored event.
“All of the instructors are just doing this because it’s fun, it’s rewarding,” he said.
“The students were canvassed and say ‘what topics were you interested in.’ And with that, we put together this program,” Bowles said. “We had a pretty good ideawe were on the money, because the students asked for this.”
The students, once presented with the final list of class options, picked their top three and were then sorted into classes that most aligned with their preferences.
Eighth-grader Matthew Martinez, who said he wants to be an electrical engineer, said his favorite was the photography and video class.
“It’s the most closely related to electronics and how they work together,” he said. “I learned about all the different types of cameras and how important it is to have a steady one.”
The class, run by Nicole Gonzalez, went outside and recorded from different types of cameras to compare stability, including one mounted on a gimbal strapped to the students’ bodies, and a drone.
Martinez said he also learned how to edit the videos he took.
Sedona Red Rock Junior High School Principal Heather Isom said her favorite part of the event was seeing how engaged the students were, even to some of the seemingly less lively sessions, like a presentation by Superintendent Tom Swaninger, Ph.D, on how to not be a jerk
“I was sitting next to Tom’s and listened to that, and he’s like ‘OK, here’s the scenario,’” she said. “He’s like, ‘be a jerk in your response to this.’”
The session overall was how to choose options to escalate a scenario instead of escalating it.
“When you’ve got a day like today, 160 kids, 11 classes, three sessions, what could possibly go wrong?” Bowles asked. “Well, the answer is a million things could go wrong, but nothing did.”
The reason, he said, was school counselor Marilyn Largen.
“It was getting information out to the presenters, getting the kids’ schedules put together and organized so that they’re clear where they’re going,” Largen said. “Even though the schedule is done, taking it from a spreadsheet, put on paper for the kids, hanging the signs out for everybody.”
She also made sure all the volunteers were fingerprinted and approved and all the classrooms had the right technology and everything it needed.
“I organized my Student Council to greet presenters as they came in and then escort them to their rooms and then give them their presenter packets,” she said. “We put together a presenter packet with all our rosters.”
This event comes from the high school’s former annual career day.
“We talked about splitting it up [to be] more applicable for middle-schoolers,” Isom said. Career day is “a lot for every year, that it seemed to be a better use of time to do the high school’s every other year and then maybe do something new and different for the middle school separately.”
