Despite a chill in the air, a small group of Anoka High School students spent the bulk of last Thursday outside, hauling and laying down brick pavers near the building's fieldhouse entrance.

The area looked like a typical construction site, with wheelbarrows, shovels, rakes, cutting tools, metal pipes and other equipment strewn here and there.

It was part of a project of the school's landscape construction class this term to create a 700-square-foot patio as a way to beautify the entryway. The initiative, while beneficial to the school, offers the students a rare on-the-job landscaping experience that goes far beyond the classroom, said its teacher, Pete Tremaine.

Although his classes have tackled other improvements around the school in recent years, this is its most ambitious undertaking so far. "It's a big project with a lot of people to manage, and it's tough work to do in November," he said.

Nevertheless, he's found that "the students have been willing to work and get out there and get it done."

The entrance is a high-traffic area, between the gym and the portable classrooms nearby, but "it hadn't gotten a lot of attention for quite a few years," Tremaine said. "It wasn't real attractive."

Fortunately, the class has a good track record, Tremaine said, and the school was receptive to a makeover.

After discussing a design, the class got to work on such details as the site's elevations. The students had to make sure that the patio would slope with the sidewalk, directing runoff away from the building. "If elevation stakes are off, it creates hills and valleys," Tremaine said.

The students ripped out old shrubs and bushes, excavating 10 yards of rock, dirt and other debris with power equipment -- or by hand.

Keeping a tree intact, they replaced an old timber planter with a retaining wall system. Meanwhile, they put together another planter nearby to visually break up the space and create more outdoor seating.

'Insane amount of work'

Last Thursday, the students pushed to finish the job. Some loaded bricks onto wheelbarrows, others "screeded," smoothing out the raw surface to create a base for the pavers, and still others fit the slabs together like puzzles pieces.

For Sam Grobel, who is a senior, seeing it all come together so quickly is part of the fun. "We just did a sample patio by the Rum River," he said. "Now we're doing something as radical as this."

To get from there to here, "We've done an insane amount of work over the past two weeks," he said.

Grobel, who owns a small lawn service, plans to pursue a career in landscaping. Amid the action, "I'm trying to do as much as possible to stay moving," he said, "to get a feel for everything."

It's an intricate process. "The next time you step on a patio, you'll look at it differently. It makes you appreciate it," he said.

Similarly, 11th-grader Aaron Zappa described the simple pleasure of laying the base of a retaining wall, which has to be just so. "You have to get it straight and level. It affects the whole wall. I'm a perfectionist, and I want it be laid correctly and looking good." It's something he'll be able to look back on for years to come, he said.

Principal Michael Farley praised their hard work. "It's a big building and we're constantly looking at ways to connect kids to the school," he said.

Anna Pratt is a Minneapolis free-lance writer.