At Central Kitsap High School, Jim Adamson is a CTE teacher who has been teaching for 30  years. One of the classes he teaches is C.A.D., which stands for Computer Aided Design. C.A.D. is commonly used by engineers, architects, and construction managers. CAD has replaced manual drafting. It helps users create designs in either 2-D or 3-D so that they can visualize the construction.

In this class, he teaches his students how to create and design a whole variety of things. Adamson likes to have his students throughout the month of May to design and cut out four different projects.

In his class, it is divided into two parts. There are the basic students or first years who he teaches the software to and machines in the back. The other is the advanced who are either in their second or third year of taking the class. These students are familiar with all of the programs and machines and the back and create advanced designs.

During May, the advanced students are assigned the same task but with higher standards. The advanced students are Kai Boydon, Preston Allan, Tristan Whittington and Michael Ramsdell.

“This is my second time going through this class and I enjoy working with all the other students, and working with the machines in the back,” said Allan.

In Adamson’s class, the students are given the ability to use multiple types of machines. Some of the machines which they can use are a laser engraving machine, a-cnc machine, a hand-held cnc machine and a wide variety of 3-D printers. These machines all have a unique way to create intricate designs on wood or metal or to create 3-D molds of something you create.

“My favorite machine and machine with the most experience is the laser engraver,” said Boydon. “I’ve made multiple projects for friends and family that I have given as presents.”

Adamson’s teaching style throughout a majority of his classes during the month of May is to have his students work on specific projects to show how they have grown throughout the school year. In his modeling class, he has them work on one animation throughout the year.

“Im working on a board game that is a project for another class for me, it has a similar style to sorry and risk,” said Ramsdell.

Adamson spends the period helping all the students with operating the machines to make sure that their projects come out of the highest quality to help preserve materials.

“In the early stages of the class, we spent a lot of time watching the board as he walked us through the software and showed us how to dimension the parts,” said Whittington. “ Now we have a lot of freedom to do what we want because we know how to work the machines and programs.”