The Enterprise: Simulated Flight Gives Students Taste of Real High-tech World
By Jesse Yeatman
Students will be able to take a class at the Dr. James A. Forrest Career and Technology Center starting next school year that will offer them lessons on flight control and the use of high-tech simulators.
Local, state and federal officials along with personnel from Patuxent River Naval Air Station and The Patuxent Partnership were at the Forrest center Friday to officially open the Aviation Classroom Experience, with computers and three flight simulator booths to put students in a game-based learning environment.
Superintendent Michael Martirano said the new classroom and simulators will "give our students real-life experiences of what it's like to experience flight."
The high school class, called Aerospace Technologies, will be offered beginning next school year. Students should have completed Algebra II and can sign up for the class with their school counselors.
Prior to that, however, the room will be used in July by younger children as part of the Forrest center's TechKids summer camp.
"It feels amazing to be able to be able to use a real-life simulator," senior Sabrina Paz said while demonstrating the new equipment. Paz is interested in becoming a mechanical engineer, she said, adding that using the simulator gives her an idea of the end result of what she may one day help build.
She said feeling like a pilot, with all of the thrills and stress, was empowering.
Senior Aaron Brice agreed, saying the simulator was a lot like some of the video games he plays at home. The robotics student used a slightly more sophisticated simulator, one of three set up in the room that has both a joystick and a throttle to control, along with three video screens.
"I think the graphics are phenomenal," Capt. Ben Shevchuk, Pax River's commanding officer, said. He said that while the technology in the classroom is not as advanced as on base, it is sure to hook students and get them interested in the field.
Lyn Whitmer, a retired naval aviator and current program manager for Lockheed Martin's F-35 USMC, is the program's coordinator and will develop lesson plans that reinforce and enrich STEM and other subjects, including reading, language arts, social studies and history.
"There is no more important enterprise in the United States than the education of our young people," Rep. Steny Hoyer (D-Md., 5th).
Hoyer spoke about his Make it in America initiative, which he said is to create jobs and bring other jobs back to the country that were outsourced. He said training and education like that provided at the Forrest center will help fill those jobs.
Business leaders and others constantly tell him how important technical training is in today's workforce, he said, and the flight academy will help attract students to that type of education.
"It's about bringing in people and getting them excited," Hoyer said.
This is the first program of this type in the Mid-Atlantic region and will be similar to those established in Pensacola, Fla.
"[Students] are the future of our country," and they need a strong education in science, technology, engineering and mathematics, Norm Augustine, a U.S. aerospace businessman, said. "This is a STEM world."
Leaders of the academy plan to expand it to the new Patuxent River Navy Museum, which has seen financial and construction delays. There could also be a component at St. Mary's College of Maryland to train teachers in the field through its master's in teaching program.
Superintendent Michael Martirano said that St. Mary's County is good at leveraging resources between groups and businesses. He thanked Gary Kessler, executive director for Naval Air Warfare Center Aircraft Division, for his efforts in helping to bring the National Flight Academy to the county.
Kessler said the academy will help train students, who in turn will help maintain the Navy's strength.
He said that through visits to other flight academies in the country, he learned that they have boosted attendance and academic performance of students.
Martirano said he is expanding the public schools' "STEM for all" initiative in other ways, including using a $2.5 million grant from the Department of Defense to buy more than 2,000 iPads for elementary, middle and high school classrooms.