Keeping the beat

Teen drummer gets 3-D prosthetic arm.

Jamarion Styles likes to make his own beats on the computer, and on the drum set at a community center in Delray Beach where he hangs out after school.

He lost most of his arms below the forearm to an infection while he was an infant, but that hasn’t stopped him from playing basketball, starring in video blogs and making music.

Now, thanks to help of a few resourceful college students, Jamarion, 13, will have another way to play the drums — using a pair of assisted devices that help him hold onto the drumsticks.

mother, Traci Keys, said her son has been fond of drumming his whole life.

“He used to get in trouble for beating on the desks at school, he just likes to beat on stuff,” Keys said. “He always, he loved the drums," Keys said.

University of Florida students Jessica Bergau, a senior, and Miles Marcus, a sophomore, designed and crafted the prosthesis as part of their university club, Generational Relief in Prosthetics, also known as GRIP.

Bergau, who founded the University of Florida chapter, said they used 3-D printed materials, fishing line and other low-cost materials to construct the devices for less that $50. The club has already made more than 20 assisted devices.

"It’s great. It kind of makes you feel like you are actually useful, but at the same time it kind of makes you want to do more and do more," she said.

Jamarion had his first fitting for the drumstick devices, and a prosthetic arm, on Monday at the Milagro Center in Delray Beach, where Jamarion spends his time after school.

Bergau and Miles helped to attach and fit each prosthetic. After testing it, they can make final adjustments for a perfect fit.

GRIP members first heard about Jamarion through AnHis

thony Bacchus, a team leadership program director at the Milagro Center, who in turn learned about the club while taking some of the teenagers he mentors on a field trip to the university.

Bacchus knew Jamarion loved the drums when he ran in and started playing on his first day at the center more than two years ago, he said. The center mentors teens.

During after-school sessions at the Milagro Center, Jamarian took drum lessons from Corey Jones, the man from Palm Beach Gardens who was shot by a police officer last year.

Bacchus looked on Monday as Jamarion received the fitting. “His spirit is so great, it’s unbelievable,” Bacchus said.

Jamarion, however, wasn’t interested in all the attention. He wasn’t sure whether he would wear his prosthetic arm at school — which he said was already difficult enough — but that he was pretty interested in the drumstick devices.

“I didn’t think this was going to happen,” he said.

CARLINE JEAN/STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER Myles Marcus, of the Florida University Club GRIP, fits Jamarion Styles of Delray Beach with a 3-D printed prosthetic arm. Styles lost his arms as an infant.

PHOTOS BY CARLINE JEAN/STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER Myles Marcus attaches a 3-D printed prosthetic arm for Jamarion Styles of Delray Beach.

Jessica Bergau, left, Jamarion Styles and Myles Marcus.The Milagro Teen Center Styles attends contacted Club “GRIP.”