A young Millbrook entrepreneur is taking the future into his own hands by using his woodworking business to not only fund his future college tuition, but to achieve his goal of taking his project on ground effect vehicles to the Canada-Wide Science Fair.
Isaiah Jalsevac founded Cutting Edge Woodworking when he was just 11 years old because, as he says, “life needs money.” Though he has explored various methods to satisfy his need to build from whittling to making knives by forging, Jalsevac ultimately decided he wanted his business to focus on woodworking.
“I’ve been into woodworking and making stuff with my hands since forever, but woodworking just seemed to be the thing I really enjoyed,” he says. “I like making stuff.”
Entrepreneurship evidently runs in the family as Jalsevac, now 15, learned the trade from his father and an uncle who runs a similar side business. He even paid homage to their influence and support by naming Cutting Edge Woodworking for the family lawn care business his dad and uncles used to own.
While Jalsevac began the business selling coffee tables and side tables, it didn’t take long for him to become more adventurous and seek out a challenge, suggesting that the farm-style tables “sound more complex than they are.”
“I got really bored because it’s just sanding and painting,” he says. “So then I got into woodturning, carving, and much more complicated artisan style.”
Using local cheery, maple, hickory, or ash, Jalsevac also makes hand-turned rolling pins, candlesticks, platters, bowls, and spinning tops. These smaller items make it easier for him to attend local farmers’ markets and the annual Hand of Man Art and Craft Sale, held in Peterborough’s Morrow Building, which he attends every fall.
To further challenge himself, Jalsevac has recently been crafting more live-edge cutting boards and he’s been trying out more off-centre wood turning, a process which intentionally has the wood mounted slightly off the lathe’s centre.
“They’re really, really fun to make, and very hard,” he says about the candlesticks he’s made through this process. “I think that’s probably something I’ve been most proud of.”
He’s also planning to dive back into doing larger pieces again, but not just the basic coffee tables, as he’s aiming for dining tables, cabinetry, and taking on more custom orders.
“I’m still developing my skills a little bit,” he says. “I’ve been building up my tool repertoire for quite a while, but it still is lacking a lot and I’m limited by space.”
That limited space is the result of his workshop being situated in his family garage, where his father also has a home workout area.
“I’m slowly encroaching on his gym step-by-step as I get each new tool, so he might put his foot down sooner or later,” Jalsevac jokes.
Another goal on the list? Hiring some of his siblings to turn Cutting Edge Woodworking into a full family affair. He is the oldest of seven siblings and though his sisters aren’t interested in woodworking, a few of his brothers have been coming into his workshop more and more.
“I’ve got a bit of pressure because my uncle got all his siblings through college basically because he hired them,” he says, adding he wants to do the same. “We’ll see how that goes — they’re not very controllable.”
While the long-term goal is to use his business to get himself and his siblings through their post-secondary education, he also hopes Cutting Edge Woodworking will be able to fund his passion for building remote-controlled airplanes.
Jalsevac is thinking about becoming a pilot, aerospace engineer, or aerodynamics engineer, and has already been making steps towards getting his pilot license by looking into scholarships. Making it to the Canada-Wide Science Fair would help him get one step closer.
“It’s on ground effect vehicles, which is a type of specially designed plane that has a huge increase in efficiency and lift,” he explains of his science fair project. “I’m trying to make some of those, test the efficiency, and go to the science fair with that.”
A ground effect vehicle is a craft designed to glide just above the surface, typically over water, by taking advantage of the “ground effect” aerodynamic phenomenon, where high-pressure air forms between the vehicle and the surface to create lift. Unlike traditional aircraft, these vehicles only operate within the ground effect zone, offering enhanced efficiency and speed with reduced drag.
Jalsevac’s ultimate goal is to make it to the Canada-Wide Science Fair, an national event hosted annual by Youth Science Canada to showcase youth innovation in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM). The national fair is the culmination of regional STEM fairs held across the country.
To make it to the national level, Jalsevac must first place as a top contender during the Peterborough Regional Science Fair, being held this year on Tuesday, April 8 at Trent University.
He says that getting to compete at the national-level competition in Fredericton, New Brunswick from May 31 to June 7 “would be a big deal.”
Despite this ambitious goal, Jalsevac admits that making it to the Canada-Wide Science Fair this year might not be in the cards.
“Turns out making planes is a little bit harder than I thought and it also requires a lot of money, so I’ve been trying to be as frugal as I possibly can and it’s backfired on me,” Jalsevac says.
He explains that he deferred purchasing the flight controller he needed to test his plane’s efficiency because it was priced at a few hundred dollars.
“I’d been postponing getting it as long as I possibly could to try and figure out a different way to get efficiency data, but I just had to bite the bullet and get it,” he says. “Now I only have a couple months until the science fair, so I’ll have some time to get results, but I won’t have time to get it as polished as I would like.”
Though it might take longer than anticipated, Jalsevac is determined not to let the setback stop him.
“I’m definitely going to enter the project in the Peterborough (Regional) Science Fair this year, but I’m just going to use it to fund my next year’s science fair project and keep going year after year.”
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