A young girl with a life-threatening illness has received a rather big present courtesy of the Warwick Area Career & Technical Center.

Throughout the beginning of the year, WACTC’s construction trades program, under the supervision of teachers Raymond Langlois and Brian Vadeboncoeur, has been making a cabin to give to Makayla Lindberg, an 11-year-old fifth-grader at Cedar Hill Elementary School with a serious illness.

Making cabins, Langlois said, is something that WACTC students have done before, with the final results displayed at the Rhode Island Home Show. Last year, though, the construction program gave the cabin they built to a child with a life-threatening disease. This year, junior Cael Shanley’s neighbor – Makayla – came to his mind instantly.

“She’s been fighting [her disease] for a while,” Shanley said. “When we were looking for a family to give a playhouse to, I had someone in mind.”

Makayla is into hunting, Langlois said. Thus, making the cabin in a hunting-lodge theme was a natural choice.

“The students went out and looked at a bunch of different ideas – cabins and hunting lodges and stuff around those lines,” Langlois said. “And they took a little from each one that they looked at and came up with this design.”

In addition to the construction students, students from WACTC’s electrical technology program joined in to give the cabin functioning power outlets and lights. That, along with installing the door and finishing the roof, were the project’s final touches.

“There are a lot more details this time [compared with last year’s cabin],” said junior Maya Medyesy, who worked mostly on painting the cabin. “It’s difficult at first, but since this is our second year building one, you get more used to it.”

John Valletta, WACTC’s electrical technology teacher, said projects like the cabin help students understand how different trades work together and showcase the creativity of both the electrical and carpentry students.

“We might have a chandelier with antlers on it, and we have light fixtures with bears on them,” Valletta said. “The students picked those out, and the students installed them. It was really neat to see.”

WACTC, according to Langlois, has a waiting list for similar items that’s large enough to cover more than two years of work, which largely sets the curriculum for students in each of the programs.

WACTC principal Tim Kane, who had checked in on the work multiple times, said that projects like this are also useful to show students how they can use the skills they gain to help those around them.

“A big part of what we do here is teaching the kids to be good members of the community,” Kane said. “Kids apply the skills they get taught in here and do something for somebody that they don’t know yet …. We’ll teach them the skills, but sometimes, it’s the life lessons that mean a little bit more.”

Having supervised the process of creating the cabin, Langlois said that seeing his students work has been a joy for him.

“The students have put a tremendous amount of work and effort into this,” Langlois said. “Their effort, their enthusiasm throughout this whole project has been second to none. And I hope that they’ve had as much fun as it looks like they’ve had doing this. It’s been a really cool experience.”

In order to keep Makayla out of school on the day the cabin was delivered – and keep it a surprise – her parents told her that a doctor was coming to see her.

As the cabin was delivered, Langlois said, she became more and more excited, going through it and making plans for it.

“She was playing with the windows. She was talking about putting a TV in there,” Langlois said. “She was thrilled.”

Seeing Makayla enjoy the project that they had worked on building for so long was something Langlois hoped would be a lifelong memory for the students. 

“Hopefully it has an impact, that being able to give something to somebody who is in need is an awesome way to contribute to the community,” Langlois said. “And I think being there firsthand – that our hard work made her smile that day, regardless of whatever else was going on – will do that.”

This story has been revised to correct two errors; an earlier version gave an incorrect age and grade level for Makayla Lindberg.