WELDING PROGRAM SUCCESS
An artificial reef built by Wakulla High welding students is loaded onto a truck.
Special to The Sun
The Wakulla High School Welding program has been busier than ever in the past few months. The semester ended with 27 students earning their AWS certified welders certification, while also learning how to use a newly purchased Radnor plasma table. The most exciting project they completed this month was a Reef project for the Gulf through Eastern Shipbuilding.
The project began with students creating a plan with specific standards from ESB to create an artificial reef that will be used to help with the ecological coral growth in the Gulf of Mexico. Surrounding schools from the area like Franklin County and Bay participated as well by creating their own reef at each school. Each class level, Welding Technology Fundamentals as well as the Welder Assistant course (Lively dual enrollment) worked on the Artificial Reef. The students were able to watch their work being moved by Eastern Shipbuilding in December.
Next on the agenda for our Welding program is preparing for the second round of certification testing through AWS. Mr. Grant is extremely excited to see his students take on Flux core testing since 90% passed the Stick test already. After testing is complete prior to Spring Break, WHS will be hosting a mini welding competition where a few local schools will compete on Wakulla High’s campus. This mini competition will help prepare all of the participating schools for the Lively Technical College Welding Competition in May where Wakulla took 2nd place overall last year.