Tag Archives: Theo Sandoz

Cannot wait to tackle more projects and camps

Posted on by | Leave a reply
A lineup of people ready to start toy cars.
Kids built solar powered cars at the renewable energy summer camp at Columbia Gorge Community College.
Photo credit: Lu Seapy.

Hello, my name is Theo Sandoz, and I am excited to be back for my  second year as an intern with Oregon State University Extension Service in Wasco County.  I am a student at OSU studying nuclear engineering.  Returning to the Wasco office feels like I never left, and the office is still as busy as ever.  I am working alongside Keon Kiser who is also a returning intern for Wasco County.  Our biggest project for the summer is planning and helping to facilitate S.T.E.M. day camps in Wasco County.  There are other projects, especially those involving our county fair, that I am also very keen on doing.

First and foremost, we have our summer camps.  So far, I have helped put on many day camps, including Aerodrone Academy, Galactic Quest and Renewables.  The Areodrone camp had our campers learning how to program and fly small drones.  Throughout this two-day camp we challenged all the campers to fly through and around obstacles and land on specific landing pads while directly controlling the drone and while the drone moved autonomously.

Another great camp that we put on is called Galactic Quest.  The curriculum for this camp comes directly from national 4-H and was a blast.  The campers made telescopes and cypher wheels and we played a lot of the Astro Adventure board game (Think Catan Spacefarers).

The most recent camp was our Renewables camp.  In this two-day camp we spent the first day learning all about solar energy and then everyone built a small solar car and got to take it home.  The second day was all about wind energy.  With a few model turbines and some box fans we were able to turn the classroom into a wind tunnel and teach kids about turbine blade design and its effect on the power that wind turbines produce.  The camps are incredibly fulfilling to put on as many of the campers get very invested in what we are teaching and bring their wild imagination to these fun events.

As August is fast approaching it is time to begin prepping for the Wasco County Fair and  Rodeo.  The Wasco County Fair runs Aug. 17-20 this year.  This is my first year since 2012 that I have not participated in 4-H as a member.  I still want to be as helpful as possible for those that are in 4-H and help put on an absolutely rocking fair and continue to do so for years to come.  Because of my position as an intern, I have unique access to planning and operating certain events at the fair.  I am most excited to work with Leah Lowe, Wasco County Extension 4-H program coordinator, on a new Livestock and Poultry Skill-a-Thon for the 2023 Fair.  This is something that we started hosting last year and we plan to expand on last year’s vision and make the Skill-a-Thon a fully fledged event that can continue to be something 4-H members in Wasco County look forward to in years to come.

For the next month there are many more projects and camps that I cannot wait to tackle!

Helping update the Wasco County Fair experience for 4-Hlivestock members

Posted on by | Leave a reply
A man records a boy telling a story
Video storytelling campers doing interviews at Sorosis Park in The Dalles.

Wasco County was created by the Oregon Territorial Legislature in 1854 and and at one time was the largest county in the United States –bigger than present-day Oregon. Today, it can still seem very old at times. Our fair structure has not changed in the time that I have been alive–until this year. One of the biggest tasks that I have gotten under this internship program is to redesign Wasco County Fair’s livestock judging contest and turn it into a Skill-A-Thon. The Extension office acquired a full set of educational posters and equipment from the Ohio State University Extension Service for each species at the Wasco County Fair. It has been my job to come up with a junior level knowledge test on all that material. We are starting at a junior level because there has not been a contest like this in Wasco County for at least 15 years and we do not want to overwhelm our 4-H and FFA kids.

This was a much larger undertaking than I originally anticipated it being. I have spent six days working on the contest already and I will need a few more still to see it through to completion. One of the greatest obstacles for this project is that there are species of animals that I know almost nothing about. I raise beef and swine at home, so those project areas come fairly easily, but I have had to learn more about sheep, goats, rabbits, cavy and poultry in the last week than I have in the last nine years of 4-H. Unfortunately, I don’t think I will be able to participate in the Skill-A-Thon as I would have an unfair advantage being the one that made it, but I hope that it makes kids realize that there is always more to learn about their animals.

One reason that the Skill-A-Thon curriculum has taken so long to make was that our Video Storytelling Camp was held last week. We gave our nine kids cameras and a computer with video editing software and we guided them through how to properly record, edit and render videos. Each of the videos were entirely unique and had the creative genius of each kid behind them. They may not have been movie quality, but for some of the fourth-graders it was their first time using a computer with a mouse. They went from learning something totally new to having a fully produced video within three days. It was immensely rewarding to see the satisfaction on the kids’ faces as we played each of their videos at the end of the camp.

Wasco County Fair is closing in, with only two weeks to go. We are getting prepared to move the Extension office out to the fairgrounds for when fair begins. Even though I am still a 4-H member it will be a lot different this year as I will be more involved in operating fair as an intern. I am looking forward to moving animals in on Aug. 17and making the most of my last year in 4-H!

Brightly colored cards with information about goats
Goat curriculum used to create parts of the Skill-A-Thon for the Wasco County Fair.

Rising at dawn to help teach STEM in Wasco County

Posted on by | Leave a reply
Theo Sandoz

Hello everyone, my name is Theo Sandoz. I just graduated The Dalles High School, and I am headed to OSU as a freshman in the fall. Through OSU Extension 4-H and FFA for the past nine years I have raised and shown beef and swine projects, done countless presentations and created enough projects to fill a treasure chest full of amazing stuff.  I was told about the OSU Extension internship program through Lu Seapy, 4-H youth development STEM educator in Wasco County. Lu was my robotics coach at the time. I started about three weeks ago and decided that this summer was for me to learn a little bit about everything.

Lu, who will be supervising me this summer, and I have known each other for a long time. She has been teaching science, technology, math and engineering (STEM) camps since I was in middle school. Now it is my job to help her plan and teach these camps as well as other staff here at Wasco Extension. One of my biggest undertakings is migrant education twice a week. We are teaching four STEM classes a day to the children of migrant workers in The Dalles starting at 6 a.m. This happens on the days that our summer camps do not conflict. This week we also have the Amazing Race, Garden Art, VEX IQ Robotics and many other camps.

I have taken on this Internship on top of my job at our local movie theater and working on our farm. This summer I decided that I was going to use all my available time to work as it is the last time before I must start paying for college. The internship program really does mean a lot to me because I have grown up in 4-H and now I am able to give back to 4-H through Extension as well as participating in my last year. Everyone here at the office is amazing to work with and I am glad that I agreed to come onboard!