A group of Redmond High School students gave up part of their Thanksgiving break to come to school Nov. 20 and finish constructing four tiny homes. The homes will soon be transported to the Oasis Village transitional housing project, where they will soon provide shelter for homeless residents.

The student construction project is nearly a year in the making. It included a number of community partners, including Hayden Homes and Parr Lumber.

The completion of the tiny homes brings Oasis Village that much closer to meeting its Jan. 10 deadline to begin operations. The deadline was mandated by the state as part of an emergency funding package earmarked for building shelters for homeless Oregonians.

Oasis Village officials said the project will soon have a community center and 15 complete tiny homes on site. The next step is to insulate and wire the structures, and put in utilities and some last final touches before taking in new residents.

The school project at Redmond high gave students a chance to both learn highly sought after construction skills and to impact their community at the same time. A group of high school students on Nov. 20 enjoyed pizza and snacks to celebrate the project’s completion.

“Today we finished working on the Oasis Village tiny homes, and they are getting ready to load them up later to get them out to their land,” said Deven Johnson, 17, a junior at Redmond High. “It took a little longer than we wanted to, but it is nice to be done and accomplish what we did … getting to know that you built something that someone will actually live in and it is not just going to be a storage shed.”

Eleanor Bessonette, executive director of Oasis Village, had lunch with the students as well as Oasis Village board members, representatives from the city of Redmond and Redmond School District faculty.

“I don’t think the Oasis board could have done it on their own, but together we can all make a difference,” Bessonette said. “Most of the youth that I’ve come in contact with, they really support service projects and want something to be done. And they are a part of that. They are going to change people’s lives. They are going to make a difference.”

Bessonette said there are currently 11 tiny homes on the Oasis Village site, and the last four, built by the students, will complete their goal of 15 before the village opens on Jan. 10. She said the last step is to get electrical wiring, and insulation in the tiny homes and water and electricity hooked up at the community center.

“A lot of things are happening in this next month or so,” Bessonette said. “It’s crunch time.”

The tiny home building project was coordinated by Alan Wheeler, as part of his construction technology class. Wheeler said his class is a good way for students to get their foot in the door of an industry that offers high paying and meaningful work. He said his students will enjoy the fruits of their labor for many years to come.

“If they see what they are doing and they are making a difference, they will always drive by those houses just like any other construction worker, and say ‘Hey, I built part of that. That was part of me,’” Wheeler said. “Having at such a young age, that value, and seeing the value of what they did and see that it lasts forever, as they drive by that every day, when they are 50 years old they will still be talking about what they did today.”

Charan Cline, the superintendent for the Redmond School District was also in attendance. He said projects like the Oasis Village tiny homes are emblematic of the district’s desire to provide opportunities for students to engage with their community, while learning industry skills and making an impact.

Cline said part of what the district hopes to instill in students is a sense of community and responsibility.

“Having a great place to live and grow and raise children is all of our responsibility,” Cline said. “So the more people that are involved and helping out a little bit to make it a better place for everybody to live is better for the entire community,” Cline said. “I think it is important because it teaches people to care about the place they live, let them know they can make a difference in small ways and at the end of the day we all learn together, grow together and hopefully the community becomes stronger together.”