New press box at East Ridge High SchoolEAST RIDGE (WRCB)- For years, the girls softball team at East Ridge High School has had a tiny makeshift press box.
But when you have you have your own Construction Academy on campus, great things can happen.
Teachers with the Academy partner with local builders and businesses, seeking donations and materials to help students hone their skills. And when they can put those skills to use for their school, it's a "win-win" for everyone.
In recent years, the masonry class, led by teacher Tim Hart, has built dugouts for the ball fields. Now the class is working on a new press box for the girls softball team, replacing a small, outdated facility. The concrete haulers and pumping truck arrived Wednesday as students prepared to pour and finish the second floor.
Junior Collin Sweatman said, "It's not as easy as it looks. You have to flatten and smooth it, get the lumps out, make sure it is all even. It has to be level all the way across."
For these students, it's their first time at the scene of a concrete job, following it all the way from delivery to hook-up, to pouring, and the smoothing-out process. They're learning a trade, and completing a building of which they can be proud for years to come.
Senior Dillon Williams said, "If I have kids someday, we can drive by and I can point to this building and tell them I helped build it in high school. I can show them what we did."
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