Just because school is out for the summer does not mean students are not learning. One local tech camp is making sure students learn and have fun at the same time.
The iD Tech Camps, which include offerings locally at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD), make available weeklong sessions for day and overnight, beginner to advanced students, ages 7 to 17, at more than 50 prestigious universities in 23 states and Spain. The local camp, which is in its ninth year in La Jolla, will run through Aug. 8 at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD).
Students learn how to create video games, experience game modding, improve gaming skills, build robots, design Web sites with Flash, produce digital movies, create comic books, learn programming and more.
As a result of attending iD Tech Camps, the student’s self-esteem improves as he or she returns to school and incorporates the learned technology into school projects and extracurricular hobbies. Oftentimes these students are mentors for other students and even teachers.
Every camper has his/her own computer and there is an average of six students per staff member.
Campers also get exposed to university life as they are on campus, work in the lab and eat in the cafeteria. Overnight campers sleep in the dorms.
At UCSD, students can also take a Surf & Tech program in which they spend half the day learning to surf and the other half making a Web site or creating a video game.
A number of local students are partaking in the learning and fun this summer, including Liberty and Montana Ruderman of La Jolla.
The two said they have learned how to make Web sites and flash animation. They first put the images together in Photoshop and then used Dreamweaver to create the code for their very own Web site.
Asked why they are attending the camp, they noted that they have their own Web site and their dad wanted them to get experience making Web sites while having fun at camp.
The two said the best thing to date at camp so far was flash animation, with Montana adding, “I made my character wave.”
La Jollan Kasi Ladjevardi is also attending this summer, noting that last year she came to this camp and made a cool video game.
“This week I’m making a Web page and animating a character in flash,” Ladjevardi said.
Asked the best thing about camp so far, Ladjevardi noted the help given by the instructor.
“She showed me how to animate my character,” Ladjevardi added.
Norby Cisneros of San Diego said that making a really cool comic book was fun.
“I also learned how to use the computer keyboard and mouse,” Cisneros said. “I used the Wacom tablet to draw pictures for my comic book named ‘Robots Attack.’ ‘The Unknown Creature’ is my second comic book I’m working on with my partner in class, Ava Ladjevardi.”
Cisneros added that the instructors are nice.
“I get tickets for the Friday raffle when I do stuff that’s good,” Cisneros added. “The best thing about the camp is that I like working with a partner to make an even cooler comic book.”
And not to leave out the local flavor, Cisneros added, “The cafeteria at UCSD is a buffet.”
There is still some space available at the UCSD camp. For further information and fees for the remaining weeks of camp, visit www.internalDrive.com or call (888) 709-TECH (8324).