SOUTH PORTLAND — The gymnasium doors opened and a handful of teens in black sneakers and khaki pants raced to a table set up with virtual reality headsets.

Soon, the residents of Long Creek Youth Development Center were waving their hands in the air while sporting the VR goggles that immersed them in simulations where they operated heavy machinery.

The facility in South Portland, which is Maine’s only youth prison, hosted groups from the Maine Community College System at a career fair Tuesday afternoon. The event offered residents a chance to explore more than a dozen career options, the Maine Department of Corrections said.

Nichole Sawyer, the dean of workforce development at Washington County Community College, hoped the VR experience would be a fun, engaging way to learn about the college’s workforce programs.

“Anytime we’re able to connect with young people to do some career development and aspirations raising, we’re all over that,” Sawyer said.

At another table, Antoine Mier, who works for the Maine Aquaculture Innovation Center, let some residents try out his water-quality testing kit. One resident peeked through a microscope at a piece of seaweed.

Mier said he wanted to tell residents about the variety of careers in aquaculture, like farming for clams, oysters and mussels, or supplying or processing seafood.

Megan Selby, a program manager at Southern Maine Community College, said letting youths have opportunities to try out careers with hands-on activities can spark their interest in possible educational and career paths.

Residents who stopped at the community college’s table strapped on headsets and carefully maneuvered a plastic welding machine replica in front of them.

“I think it’s important that the people that are in this facility get the same opportunities and exposure to possibilities as anyone else,” Selby said. “That was part of the reason that we bought mobile units, so that we could go out to people instead of having them come to us.”

The event was a positive development for Long Creek, which has struggled with staffing shortages and a series of escapes, most recently in August, when three teenagers broke out of the South Portland facility and were later located in Saco.

The attempted escape of nine teens in 2024 provided insight into the turmoil that caused attorneys and staff to plead for help.