By Brianne Williams, Sellwood Librarian

Jeffrey and Will and their volunteer mentors really did a fantastic job with this series. They were very responsive to the participants’ interests and abilities, and engaged them actively. They helped participants build relationships among themselves, and to really work as a team. The mentored them in problem solving, and helped them communicate and assess challenges.  All this while laughing, having fun, and being incredibly creative!

Moreover, they are all very skilled in ways to work with challenging teens, and did a great job with a teen who had trouble focusing and being disruptive. They used distraction, gentle suasion, refocusing, to help him continually get back on track and to minimize disruptions to the team.

One boy came all the way from Philomath to the take the class. He said his aunt (who lives in Portland) gave him the class for his birthday present and he was staying with her for the week to take it.

On the last day of class, 2 of the girls showed up almost 40 minutes early.  Jeffrey’s immediate response was, “come on in!  Grab a computer or let me show you what I’m working on.”

That really summed up the week for me in a powerful way.  These guys are all about welcoming all teens into the world of prog ramming and creativity and gaming, and making sure they build skills while having a great time.