The filmmakers and engineers of tomorrow are acquiring the skills they need to excel in their fields in school today.
That was evident in Point Loma High School instructor Anthony Palmiotto’s cinematic arts and engineering teacher Mike Tritchler’s classes, as their students concluded their final projects at the end of May ending the 2024 school year.
Both PLHS engineering and cinema arts students recently competed in The Aspen Challenge presented by the Aspen Institute, aspenchallenge.org. The challenge champions the role of artists and cultural leaders as critical thought leaders, futurists, and change makers. Through its programs, the Aspen Institute connects artists and leaders across all fields to enlighten and inspire them to face some of the world’s greatest challenges.
“We’re the No. 1 school in the whole (San Diego Unified) school district, hands down,” said Palmiotto of his multimedia and cinematic arts students, some of whom are graduating and going off to film schools and broadcast journalism programs. “Those who take the advanced class are making short films and documentaries doing things like cinematography, production design, and special effects.”
Palmiotto noted one of his theater arts students, Miles Brower, took first place in a recent PSA ‘If You See Something, Say Something’ contest. “It was a nice little score for a class project,” he said adding Brower is “going to have his film played on Cox cable 100 times this summer.”
Palmiotto pointed out that PLHS’ engineering class also did “some crazy stuff” this year, noting students there actually created a software program allowing a wheelchair to be remotely controlled by a smartphone.
Mike Tritchler runs PLHS’s engineering pathway program for science-oriented students like senior Nicholas Newsom. Newsom said he “learned a lot doing actual real-world stuff” in Tritchler’s class. Aspiring to be an aerospace engineer Newsom added he “definitely wants to work with rockets and aerospace.”
So how does Newsom get from here – to there?
“This is a great starting program for it (aerospace engineering),” answered Tritchler. “To get to that point (career employment) it’s going to be making connections and setting up internships while in college. A lot of students that do end up getting these internships that roll over every year, they get job offers pretty much in their senior year, right before they graduate as they segue into their career field.”
Tritchler said Newsom, for his school engineering project, had to design and build a cube accomplishing a scientific investigation measuring some scientific aspect of the Earth.
Back in Palmiotto’s cinematic arts class in its green theater production room, students Miles Brower and Jacob Beach talked about the cinematic projects they conducted under Palmiotto’s watch.
“We had a series of projects each highlighting a different thing, whether it be storytelling, audio design, or the basic aspects of the film,” said Brower, who did a short film and a PSA, which won him first place and $1,200 in a contest, about teenage depression. “It was about the leading causes of it (depression), and how sometimes just talking to someone can help someone get through a troubling time,” noted Brower adding, “I’ve had friends who have had depression. The main thing that got them through it was friends and people supporting them. Of all the PSA topics we could have picked — depression affects the most people.”
Third-place PSA winner Jacob Beach’s project, which won him $500 in the PSA contest, was about bullying and school violence. Describing his 30-second short film Beach said: “It starts with a kid walking into class and getting bullied. The next day he doesn’t show up to school. One of his friends texts him asking him where he is. He’s (bullying victim) joking that he’s going to attack the school, and the friend who sent him the text doesn’t believe him because he thinks it’s a joke and doesn’t report it. The next day he (bullied kid) does show up to attack, and right before he goes into the school he just says, ‘Not everything’s a joke.’”
Concluded Beach: “Nowadays, things aren’t taken seriously, which was the whole point of my PSA.”
So what did Beach and Brower learn from doing their PSAs?
“It gave me ideas for making more PSAs in the future and was also a portfolio piece,” answered Beach.
“I’ve always taken my projects seriously, but they’ve always been lighthearted,” replied Brower, who added this PSA pushed him to strive harder. “I got my friends to help act. Since we only had 30 seconds (film duration), this was a real challenge. With this, you had to think. I had to put a lot of effort into each shot.”
