Education gets dirty

By denise dick | denise_dick@vindy.com

CANFIELD

About 150 Mahoning County Career and Technical Center students trudged through mud, plunged into ice water and scaled 5-foot-high bales of hay as an exercise in team-building and camaraderie.

It was the fourth MCCTC McMudder on Friday at the center. The “Mc” is for Mahoning County.

Junior Patrick Byrne of Canfield said the Arctic Plunge – a pool filled with ice water near the beginning of the course – was the most difficult.

“You had to stay under the water to get under the wire,” he said.

Rope strung a few inches above the pool ensured participants got deep enough to get sufficiently cold and wet.

Some teams dressed in costumes or uniforms. Patrick, an engineering student, and his teammates donned red bow ties and white button-down shirts painted with vertical red stripes. They wrote “Baber’s Barbers” across the back for engineering instructor Walter Baber.

“Kids sometimes call him Mr. Barber,” he explained.

The course stretched eight-tenths of a mile behind the center’s rear parking lot.

“It gets bigger every year,” said Matt Putzier, culinary arts instructor and one of the event’s organizers.

He was referring to both the course and the participation.

“The first year we had 40 students and this year we have 150,” said Anina Karlovic, a government teacher and event organizer.

Teachers and administrators got into the end-of-the-school-year activities, too. Putzier joined his students for the run.

For the course’s last station, teams of four students had to flip truck tires along the lawn.

“A team doesn’t finish until every team member finishes so it’s all about team-building and camaraderie,” Putzier said.

Some participants clutched their sides as they crossed the finish line, mud covering the clothes and limbs. Others dropped to the ground to catch their breath.

The team of juniors Morgan Groom of West Branch and Steven Derr, Dustin Joy and Emma Smith, all of South Range, joined forces despite being part of different programs.

Morgan and Emma are in medical occupations, Steven is in auto collision and Dustin, electricity.

What was the best part?

“The end,” Morgan said.

All four teammates agreed the Arctic Plunge was the worst part.

“It was too crowded,” Steven said. “I got kicked in the head.”

Except for Emma, though, the team members, who called themselves “#Haterade,” said they plan to conquer the course again next year.