SACO, Maine — The Sweetser School in Saco is teaching students how to make and sell maple syrup this season.
Maine's annual Maple Sunday Weekend is quickly approaching, and students said they're excited about getting outside and learning what goes into Maine's maple industry.
"Ever since I was little, I loved going outside. It's just one of my favorite activities, ever since I was 5 years old," Shandi Clements, a sophomore at Sweetser, said.
The alternative learning approach at the school helps kids learn new skills outside of the classroom.
With the hands-on learning experience, students are seeing what goes into the industry, and even how to make a career out of it.
"For the high school kids finding out what they might be interested in for a job in the future," Birtolo said.
From drilling the hole into the tree and collecting the sap to chopping the wood, letting it boil, and bottling it up, these students have learned to love the process.
"I like the wood chopping because it sometimes gets your anger out," Zeke Young, a sophomore at Sweetser, said.
This labor of love is not easy, Sweetser needs 30 gallons of raw sap to produce just 1 gallon of syrup.
"They feel successful in a way that maybe they didn't when they were sitting in a classroom and they just thought to themselves, 'I can't do math. Math is hard, so I'm just going to act out,'" Birtolo said.
At the end of the season, students produce up to 21 gallons of syrup to sell to their families.