As the “STEAM ON!” Tech Teardown at the Jefferson County Library entered its second week, program supervisor Emily Bufford admitted it’s been almost as much of an education for her as it’s been for the youngsters who have joined her in deconstructing computers and their related accessories.

Bufford, herself a student, but at the graduate school level, has aimed to foster “competence and curiosity about technology” among the young people who file in on Wednesday afternoons.

They took apart a desktop computer March 20 before doing the same with a laptop March 27.

It’s all part of public libraries’ new focus on experiential learning.

The acronym STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math) was coined in 2001 by the National Science Foundation as a way of describing desirable workforce skills and training objectives.

The Jefferson County Library, embracing the community ethos, added A...for arts and calls this programming STEAM.

Hence Bufford’s supervision of the careful demolition of tech tools.

“They break the computers down and look at all the parts to figure out how they work together,” Bufford said, adding that the computers in question are all older models owned and donated by the library. “They also get to compare desktops to laptops. They get really enthusiastic over this work, especially with the desktops, which have components they’re less likely to see on a day-to-day basis.”

Bufford added the third week, April 3, would see her pupils disassembling add-on tools like keyboards and laser printers.

“I think they’ve learned it’s all a lot more complicated than they expected,” Bufford said.

Marrowstone Island resident Lucy Johnson, 8, cited other aspects of the Tech Teardown she found appealing.

“I get to have fun with my friends,” Johnson said. “It doesn’t matter whether I succeed or fail, as long as we have a good time.”

Chimacum’s September Crow, 9, agreed that she liked making new friends at the Tech Teardowns, although she also appreciated being able to study what’s under the shell of relatively recently produced computers and other devices.

“I enjoy seeing what sorts of things are inside,” Crow said. “It’s cool, even if it’s hard to take them apart.”

Fellow Chimacum resident Keanu Morrison, 11, was joined by his grandfather, Lige Christian, who found it just as enlightening an experience.

“I work a lot with computers, but in different ways,” Morrison said, elaborating that he writes code, but humbly emphasizing that it’s in “the simplest code language.”

Christian is no stranger to technology, having worked as an electronics technician in the U.S. Navy back in the 1950s.

“We still had vacuum tubes back then,” Christian said. “We didn’t even have transistors yet. Once it became possible for computers to have memory, everything changed.”

Fellow grandparents William and Doris Albrecq aren’t electricians or engineers, but like their 6-year-old grandson Justus, their Port Ludlow family “has its brains in its hands,” according to William.

“Last week, he came here and was a natural at tearing things apart,” William said of Justus. “He’s a thinker and a tinkerer. It helps him build manual dexterity by doing something other than playing video games, and it gives him an opportunity to interact with other kids.”

Doris added, “When he took the desktop computer apart, he actually said, ‘I can’t believe I could do that!’”