By Andra Bryan Stefanoni

news@joplinglobe.com

PITTSBURG, Kan. — Were it not for a new masonry class at Pittsburg High School, two of the nine students enrolled in it say they probably wouldn’t be in school at all. Two others say it’s the only thing they like about school, because they are not “pencil and paper” students.

The class is part of a comprehensive construction trades program put in place this fall by Fort Scott Community College in partnership with four Southeast Kansas school districts.

Funded by a $2 million grant awarded in April by the Department of Labor, the program is an answer to a problem that was twofold, said Chris Sterrett, director of construction trades at the Fort Scott school and the grant’s administrator. Construction maintains the most consistent growth of all industries in the United States, but there is a chronic need for workers, he said.

“The construction industry is one of the largest employers in the country, and it is facing huge shortages of trained craftsmen, which means deadlines can’t be met,” Sterrett said. “It pushes back recovery from natural disasters like Hurricane Katrina. There are just not enough workers to do jobs.”

There also is a segment of students who are not college-bound that high schools have been challenged to serve, he said.

“National statistics show that in the current ninth-grade class, 28 percent of them will go on to get a four-year degree,” Sterrett said. “Thirty-two percent of them will need advanced training, 10 percent lack the skills to get gainful employment, and 30 percent will drop out.”

But, Sterrett said, only 20 percent of today’s jobs require a four-year degree, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ Occupational Outlook Handbook.

“Sixty-five percent of today’s jobs need future training at a vocational school or community college such as ours,” he said.

Enter the construction trades program at Fort Scott Community College. Pittsburg High School Principal Donna Zerr said it came at a wonderful time.

“Occupational programming is expensive, and we lack the resources to do both that and academic programming,” Zerr said.

She said the program fills an important gap in what PHS provides, and she believes that schools and communities should work toward getting past the mind-set that college degrees are something for which all students should strive.

Those who participate at PHS, Girard High School, Fort Scott High School and Northeast High School at Arma can earn industry-recognized credentials in carpentry, masonry, electrical and plumbing, heating and air conditioning, and safety. Certificate programs are being developed for concentration in specific trades.

“We have such interest in the new welding program at Girard, which is a night class, that adult community members are wanting to sign up to take it,” Sterrett said.

Bud Johnson, an award-winning instructor who taught masonry at a career center in Oklahoma, teaches the PHS program. He said it should give students who had few chances before gain skills that have instant marketability.

“They literally can walk out of here and take $400 and get the tools they need — good tools, because bricklayers don’t need much — and start out making $15 an hour,” he said. “If they get a union job, that’s $29 an hour. And there’s a real need for it. The average age of masons right now is 47, and look at all the projects that demand it.”

Johnson had just a week to recruit students like Daniel Blair, a junior, who enrolled because he saw the value in having a skill that is so needed.

“I thought this way I probably would never be out of a job,” he said. He said he was absent from other classes before, but he never misses the masonry class.

Blair and his fellow classmates are learning mechanical skills such as repairing a mortar mixer, discipline and how to meet deadlines, and applied math in estimating bricks and laying out a job.

“This opens up many doors for our kids,” Zerr said. “Their education is now focused, and they have a reason to come to school and something they care about. We have one student, a senior, who lives on his own and supports himself. He works a minimum-wage job, and somehow he makes it. But when he gets through this class, this will give him a highly marketable skill that he can use to pull himself up even more.”

Sterrett said putting the program in place at several locations in such a short time was nothing short of a miracle. He attributed the success in doing so to a highly visible need that everyone saw.

“They see the possibilities and the transformation of students who can engage, in a very practical way, when they might not have been before,” he said.

The best part of the program, administrators agree, is the articulation agreements in place, something those involved call “2+2+2.”

“This program allows students to earn industry-recognized credentials and be in a national registry in multiple trades,” Sterrett said.

“Then they’re given the opportunity to pursue an associate’s degree at FSCC without having to complete duplicate course work, which makes them even more marketable when they’re done with that. Then, if they choose to go to Pittsburg State University, they can enter as a junior and, again, not have to repeat classes. They come out as a skilled craftsman with real wage-earning potential.

“Or, at any time along the way, they could take the off-ramp and go right into the marketplace.”

Officials are planning to expand the program to include Uniontown High School next spring, and eventually offer it from Crawford County up to Miami County.