Written by Alyssa Burley.
Project Cornerstone visited Diego Valley Charter High School on November 24, 2015 and February 9, 2016 at its El Cajon and Lakeside campuses.
Two students decided to share their Project Cornerstone experience. Their letters were read at the Project Cornerstone Annual Meeting on February 25, 2016.
Lyzette Rubenstein
“Hi my name is Lyzette Rubenstein. I’m a student at Diego Valley at our Lakeside Learning Center and I participated in the concrete seminar. I enjoyed participating in the seminar because I’m a kinesthetic learner and I prefer having a hands-on experience learning. That is exactly what the seminar was. The project tied a lot into math and science, because we had to make measurements and calculations. We got to learn about the different rocks and sand such as the sand that came from the beaches and sand that came from the river. I feel that having more projects that are hands on would be very helpful for students, because they get to learn in a new way and interact with others and the material is right there in front of them rather thanreading out of a textbook or getting a lecture. I hope in the future we get more opportunities to do more seminars like this in our school at Lakeside Learning Center.”
Download Lyzette Rubenstein’s letter.
Lyzette Rubenstein, Student at Diego Valley Charter School.
Samantha Moses, Student at Diego Valley Charter School.
Samantha Moses
“Last month I was encouraged to participate in a hands on lab about construction and concrete. During the lab, the interaction between students and the Project Cornerstone instructors was great. We worked closely with sand and other minerals found in concrete, which was really interesting because we learned about their applications in real life. I never thought about how widely common the use of concrete is before participating in this class.
My favorite part of the class was mixing different dry materials and watching the reaction as it became wet concrete. It was pretty amazing to see how you can take small amounts of rocks and mix them with sand and water to make concrete. After making our own concrete, we were able to place the concrete into molds to make different shapes and figures. We were also able to add die, using colored powder, to make the molds colorful. You could tell everyone was having a great time because students all wanted to try multiple molds. I really enjoyed interacting with the other students and being able to work together and help one another.
It taught me a lot more about concrete and construction than I would have ever known before. I learned a lot about the huge piles of sand we all see on the side of the freeway and how it’s used as part of construction materials. Also knowing how roads and buildings are made was very intriguing. I learned about cement trunks and how costly they are to use because you can expect to pay roughly $120 to $200 per cubic yard.
The workshop was even related to my Earth Science class because we made a mixture using different rocks, sand, and water. We also learned about the composition of many building materials. The class helped expose us students to a wide variety of career choices within the construction industry. I thought it was interesting to think about a career in construction for my future.
Samantha Moses”