History department head Kevin Delaney led a woodworking workshop in WHS’ new Innovation Realization Lab for junior and senior students on Friday as part of Winter Week. In the lab, which was introduced students are free to invent, create and brainstorm new and innovative ideas.

“I was asked by Ms. Bishop and a few students if I [could] do a woodworking demonstration,” Delaney said. “I’ve been a woodworker [and] furniture maker for 35 years or so.”

The task was simple: listen to the instructions, look at the picture demonstration, and build a small but sturdy bird house with speed and efficiency.

Delaney has worked with wood ever since he was very young. He believes woodworking is not only a good way to “get away from school stuff,” but that it is also a sort of therapy.

“I’ve been woodworking since I was seven or eight years old. I tinkered a lot, always with wood, never with machinery or anything. That’s what I do when I need to get away from school stuff,” Delaney said. “It’s fun, [so] that’s what I’ll do in my retirement, which is not too many years from now.”

Students in the workshop appeared very determined to finish their projects.

“I enjoy getting a break from classes and looking at new things that I usually don’t see in my life,” senior Steven Luo said.

“I really like drilling this hole. It was pretty wild; the power I felt in my hands when I pushed that drill bit into the wood,” junior Yaniv Goren said.

“Everybody has the ability to make cool stuff. If this [workshop] exposes the makerspace a little bit and gets one or two kids thinking about it, then [I believe it has] succeeded,” Delaney said.