The more than 600 students of Western Center Academy haven’t attended class at the Hemet charter school since March 13.
“We were told that we would be off for three weeks and we were told that we come back a week after spring break,” said Rebecca Pizzitola, 16. “And that did not happen.”
But despite the coronavirus pandemic, they’ve been able to wander the campus and spend time in classrooms virtually, thanks to the efforts of Pizzitola and her friend, Caroline Lovett. The girls have recreated the school, which shares a campus with the Western Science Center museum, in the video game Minecraft.
Pizzitola got the idea in mid-April.
“I saw a video of Minecraft Disneyland and it was just the coolest thing ever and you could go on the rides,” she said. “I thought ‘we should do that for school.”
She found a willing partner in Lovett, whom she’s known since sixth grade and became good friends with in high school.
“I’m always looking for a project to do,” said Lovett, 17. “I just went from arts and crafts to saying ‘I need something to do that will take more than an hour.’”
Of the two, Lovett is the more hardcore Minecraft player.
“I’ve been playing since (version) 1.2.5, so that’s almost 10 years now,” she said. “I’ve always focused more on building and design in the game.”
The build took the girls 18 days and 9,852,258 blocks to build the academy.
“There were rooms that I didn’t know and rooms that she didn’t know,” Pizzitola said. “So it was helpful to have someone whose (school) life wasn’t the same.”
They also emailed academy middle school teachers to find out where classrooms had moved to since the girls had moved on to high school and friends and family members got them aerial photos of the campus for references.
All of the work was a welcome escape from academics, which was hitting a fever pitch in April and May.
“For me, at least personally, I had a lot of schoolwork still. In the middle of our project, I had four AP exams to study for and a final exam, so Minecraft was my way to relax after a long day of work,” Pizzitola said.
There are no exploding creepers or skeletons firing arrows in their version of the Western Center Academy. And there are no students digging holes through the walls of classrooms. The girls set their map to allow players to explore the campus and teleport back to the middle of it at the click of a button, but not get into any mischief.
Fellow students at the STEM charter school approved of the project once it was unveiled.
“I think our school is pretty dorky in general, so we have a respect for that,” Pizzitola said. “The response was really positive.”
But like the academy itself and the museum it shares the grounds with, the girls’ Minecraft school will be closing its doors. Visits to the virtual campus by their classmates are way down and the girls don’t want to continue paying for server space to keep it available. They’re not ruling out bringing it back in the fall. And they’re considering working on another project together for the rest of the summer, although they’re not ready to announce what it is just yet.
Both girls will be seniors when school restarts in the fall. After graduation, Pizzitola wants to study neuroscience in college with the goal of becoming a researcher, while Lovett wants to attend UC San Diego to major in theater or performing arts, with the goal of becoming a professional actor or theater teacher.
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June 13, 2020 at 02:21AM
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Hemet students recreate Western Center Academy in Minecraft - Press-Enterprise
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