Guitar building teaches math, science lessons
For Butler County Community College professor Mike Aikens, guitars have more than rock star appeal.
They have classroom appeal, for students and teachers alike.
Aikens has taught a course where community college students build their own guitars for several years now, but he is hoping the idea will pick up in area high schools as well.
At the end of a weeklong workshop Friday, Aikens was teaching teachers the art of guitar building, a comprehensive task that incorporates mathematics, physics, machining, electronics and woodworking. The work requires very precise measurement, especially when it comes to spacing each of the frets, according to Aikens. If they are off, the guitar will never sound like it's supposed to.
The project is one example of a broader initiative called STEM, or Science, Technology, Engineering and Math education, designed to get students interested in the hard sciences.
"The guitar has proved to be a very engaging project for the students," Aikens said. "What we're really doing is jamming 25 pounds of you know what in a 5-pound sack."
In other words, the project offers a lot of value.
That is something Aikens hoped to relay to 12 area high school science and industrial arts teachers who were paired together to complete instruments last week.
Dean Walker, a physics teacher at Seneca Valley High School, said he cannot play a note on the guitar, but that didn't matter.
"It's a context that's interesting," Walker said. He added that a guitar building program would draw in all types of students.
"It stops having that separation between the honors physics student and industrial arts student; now they are the same student," Walker said.
"Kids will be more interested in learning material when they have a hands-on application for it," Butler High physics teacher Tad Campagna said.
Campagna, like many teachers, said the guitar building class would probably start out as a club at Butler, with the potential to become a full semester course if there is a lot of student interest.And who isn't interested in guitars?The workshop on Friday often looked more like a rehearsal studio then a manufacturing room, with teachers testing out a few power chords on their finished projects.One guitar, made by physics teacher Josh Locklear and his partner, computer-aided drafting teacher Angelo Pappano, featured a series of psychedelic swirls made by dipping the guitar body into a mix of paint, water and borax.The borax breaks the surface tension of the water, allowing paint to surge up through the water and stick to the guitar, according to Locklear.The finished product will be going back to Locklear's school, The Southwest Career and Technical Academy in Las Vegas.That school will host Aikens and his colleague Mike Robinson, an industrial arts professor at Butler County Community College, for another weeklong workshop in January.It's safe to say word has gotten around about the program, considering the buzz has made it all the way to the city of lights.The program has a bright future, receiving funding from a National Science Foundation grant and backing from various higher education institutions, including Purdue University.Robinson, the project's other creator, sums it up well. "The appeal is the ability to show students the full cycle: concept, design and manufacturing," Robinson said. "It's the mother of all projects."
