On your mark, get set, go!
Races are part of every summer camp, but they?re a bit different at the two-week Dell TechKnow (yes, it?s a pun) programs held throughout Baltimore County in June and July.
Wednesday at Lansdowne Middle School, four teams of students competed to see who could pull the hard drive out of a desktop computer the fastest and ? this is important ?screw everything back in properly.
“Is that a hard drive?” asks instructor Ben Conry rhetorically, as one group looked ready to yank out the mother board.
“Mr. Conry, Mr. Conry, Mr. Conry,” shouts Joey Young, David Wiseman, Jimmy Shipley and John Decker from the first table as Brandon Dellangello, 13, holds the prized, flat, 6-inch occasional bane of existence overhead.
“I got it, I got it,” yells Ishema Ellis, 12, who goes to Lansdowne Middle with the boys.
“OK,” answers Conry, who has given each group five minutes to dissect their project. “Now put it back.”
The computer camps offered by Baltimore County in partnership with Dell, Microsoft and AOL are growing in their third year and have nearly doubled this summer to 150 students, most headed to eighth grade in the fall.
Students learn how to take apart and rebuild computers, install software like Microsoft Office, Word and Excel, run diagnostics, troubleshoot basic hardware problems, and use the Internet safely.
Here?s the kicker: At the end of the course, students who successfully complete the training and pass three exams are awarded their refurbished Dell desktop computer to use at home. The graduation rate so far is 100 percent.
“We figure with the computer and the software, plus AOL throws in a year?s free subscription, it?s worth about $1,000,” said Ann Horner of the Baltimore County technology department.
The camps at Lansdowne, Golden Ring, Woodlawn Middle School and Winfield Elementary School, operate two sessions a day, from 8:30 to 11:30 a.m., and then with a different group from 12:30 to 3:30 p.m. Typically classes have 20 students with two teachers. The students say they aren?t missing much during the day except television and snacking time and volunteer that they?re learning a lot and enjoying the three hours at a day at camp.
“It?s fun. Your friendsare here anyhow,” Young said.
“We?re learning how the different computer parts work with each other, the hardware, the software, the operating system ? everything,” said Wiseman, who doesn?t have a computer at home, but will soon. “Before, I didn?t know anything about what was inside the machine.”
