How do you get the message across that there are great employment opportunities in millwork, cabinets, furniture, and woodworking?

The best way is to show the workplace and its use of new technology. And to meet people who have had successful careers at companies that offer opportunities and advancement.

A recent event organized by industry, associations, and education achieved that and more.

The idea for the event was developed by Chris Hofmann, Woodworking Machinery Industry Association’s Education Committee chairman and U.S. Lamello product manager for Colonial Saw. WMIA organized the event with the help of Skills for Rhode Island’s Future, and Herrick & White, a Cumberland, Rhode Island, a manufacturer of architectural millwork, which hosted the meeting and provided tours as well.

Initially, Hofmann wanted to develop a live trade show-type event.

“When I was appointed chair of the WMIA Education Committee, I had a vision for developing something like a condensed trade show environment that would involve vocational high school students, educators, hopefully parents, industry vendors, and all the while also be centered around an engaging tour of a contemporary, dynamic shop,” he said.

“We found a great partner in Herrick & White to launch this concept for our inaugural event and I couldn’t be more pleased with the outcome. Feedback from the students and educators was terrific. By introducing the students to the shop environment, industry vendors, and post-secondary woodworking schools, we gave them a great cross-section of many available opportunities all in the span of about two hours per school.

Hofmann said there were five schools that participated, including 80 students. WMIA is in the planning stages for a similar event in Massachusetts for the spring of 2019. Once that second event is complete, he said they are going to work to create nationwide events multiple times per year.

Another participant, Skills for Rhode Island’s Future, is an organization that provides high school students with paid summer work-based internships. The program connects education with the workplace, allowing students to learn about a job they may want to pursue.

 

 

Changing perceptions

Ken Bertram, president of Herrick & White, said that he and Hofmann had earlier discussed the need to change the perception of the woodworking industry, which led to the open house concept at his architectural millwork company.

“We have been working with schools over the past several years, bringing in student interns for the purpose of bringing youth into the industry,” he said. “This was a great opportunity to capture many students at one event.”

Bertram said that people have the perception of the woodworking industry as a couple of guys in a garage covered in dust and missing some digits. This perception makes it more challenging to find employees.

Also, there is little emphasis on the trades in school.

“Primarily kids are guided towards college,” Bertram said. “The schools have had their vocational programs decimated by budget cuts so the kids that actually want to pursue a vocation don’t get the level of experience necessary or the building (of) enthusiasm for the trade. One of the goals of this event is to start to change the perception and make woodwork manufacturing an enticing opportunity for the future workforce.”

Bertram said that Herrick and White wanted to demonstrate that woodwork manufacturing reaches far beyond assembling a cabinet at a bench, and that there are career opportunities available, such as supervision, engineering, estimating, project management, accounting, sales and marketing.

“We wanted them to understand that if they came in with drive and a great attitude they can enter a trade right out of school and then develop their career in a direction they choose,” he said.

 

 

Partnering with industry

Larry Hoffer, WMIA president and CEO, said that the asscoaition’s member companies are also involved in this effort.

“Many WMIA-member companies pursue different avenues to solve the skills shortage, such as partnering with local VAs to find employees and developing internships with schools in their area,” Hoffer said. “On the whole, WMIA is part of WIRC, the Wood Industry Resource Collaborative, a multi-association collaboration that is working to bridge the skills gap by changing the perception of the industry among the next generation, their parents, and school counselors.

“(At this event) the students had the chance to better understand the diversity of the woodworking industry, the different machines and software used and the philosophies behind them, and they had the opportunity to talk with professionals currently working in the industry, to see what career paths might be available to them and how they might pursue them.”

WMIA is working on another open house in early 2019. “It is our goal to hold at least four of these events next year, and eventually create a prototype that our members can utilize in their own communities by partnering with vendors and schools in their area,” Hoffer said.

 

View from education

One of the schools participating in the event was the Woonsocket Area Career and Tech Center. Charlie Myers teaches Architectural Construction Technology, and has been an instructor there for 21 years.

“We do not have any woodworking programs anywhere with the Woonsocket Education system at any age or level,” he said. “We will work on a woodworking project on an individual basis if a student would like to build a bookcase or shelf but the program was not recruiting enough students to keep it active.

“The wood shop classes in the middle schools have also been eliminated when the teachers retired. The wood shop class in the high school has also been chopped. There is no longer any exposure to any trades until a student goes on a tour in the ninth grade. It is difficult to demonstrate all of the possible career paths in construction in a seven-minute time limit.”

Myers said he really enjoyed this event, and six students filled out an application to work there.

“This is a career that they had not considered before the tour,” he said. “I believe they finally saw a combination of skills and artistry in the projects being made there. They were also excited that two former graduates had worked their way from the entry level to an ownership level.

“I believe they saw a career where they can advance within a company and support themselves as adults. I think this is what they are looking for. A means to support themselves and their families as their skills improve….so will their income. I do not believe they have seen any examples of this in their employment so far and they were excited!”

 

Shop tour

Herrick & White president Ken Bertram showed a video to each group and described the history of the company, which started in 1977 and makes high-end specialized architectural millwork.

The company has many highly skilled and experienced longtime employees, but Bertram said that 10 percent of the current workforce.

“We are committed to growing our own workforce,” he said.

Company representatives emphasized to students that there were great opportunities for growth and promotion within the company, and offered their own experiences of holding many different positions as examples.

Gary Rousseau, executive vice president of sales and marketing, outlined his experience from Woonsocket Vocational to Herrick & White, dating back to 1979. He ran the shop, purchasing, and sales and marketing. “They gave me confidence,” he said. “And every day is a new adventure.”

Steve Brannigan is executive vice president of finance and chief financial officer, and also has had a long career at the company with many different positions. He said it is about much more than woodworking. “I have done every position in this company,” he said. He believes students today have the same opportunity he did, and Herrick and White is dedicated to growing their own talent.

In the shop, students saw the engineering department and saw how project management was handled from planning to installation.

They looked at the process beginning with rough lumber, cutting and machining, and assembly and fabrication.

In the shop were a Holzma panel saw, Anderson Exxact CNC router, Brandt edgebander and SawStop table saws. Of special interest to students was a Weeke Optimat BHP 008 CNC machining center, demonstrating the technology used in wood products manufacturing today.

 

Vendor contact

A group of industry organizations and companies was also present at the event, and visiting students could meet and ask questions of any of the representatives.

In addition to WMIA, the Woodwork Career Alliance was present, along with Colonial Saw, Stiles Machinery, KCD Software, Weinig-Holz-Her, SawStop, Cabinet Vision and Atlantic Machinery.

Herrick & White actually received one application from a student the day of the event, and several more students said they would apply and many took applications with them.

“I expect we’ll pick up a couple of student interns in the short term,” said Ken Bertram. “I expect our summer intern program will have several more applications, and more students will pursue woodworking as a career choice then before the event.”

“This mission to expose the youth to the modern day woodwork manufacturing environment is imperative for the future of the industry.  Great job from Skills for Rhode Island’s Future and WMIA for pulling it all together!”

 

https://bit.ly/2Dw3GWz

 

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By Jennie Sparandara

Posted Jun 29, 2018 at 5:50 PM

Earlier this year, more than 100 educators and business leaders from Rhode Island and across the country met in Providence to talk about preparing students to succeed after high school and in their career.

During this national convening on career readiness, Ty’Rell Stephens, an 11th grader at Juanita Sanchez High School in Providence, talked about the opportunities he has access to in high school, and how they have increased significantly since his freshman year. Ty’Rell is participating in the community development career pathway at his school and will earn several college credits before he graduates.

Through the PrepareRI initiative, Ty’Rell’s experience is being replicated at schools across Rhode Island, with more students than ever are earning college credits, tackling advanced coursework, and gaining hands-on work experience that will set them on a path to postsecondary success.

Hearing about gatherings like the one in Providence reaffirms for me the importance of involving industry leaders in the design of education. My company, JPMorgan Chase, is working in Rhode Island and nine other states through a $75 million initiative called New Skills for Youth. We developed New Skills for Youth in collaboration with the Council of Chief State School Officers, Advance CTE, and Education Strategy Group. The effort includes a $35 million investment in states to strengthen career readiness approaches, giving students multiple pathways to training and education beyond high school.

Career pathways — which include anything from health sciences to business administration to agriculture — allow students to build real-world skills, explore career opportunities and find a career path that they are passionate about before they begin college.

One of the pathways educators and business leaders have teamed up on is the newly created process technician pathway, which will prepare students to enter an Environmental and Life Sciences program at the post-secondary level and to be job ready as a process technician, a job that earns an average of $24 per hour in Rhode Island. The pathway was created in partnership with higher education officials and leaders from several of the state’s largest biomedical and pharmaceutical employers in response to their industry’s needs. It combines academic requirements such as life sciences, chemistry and math, with safety training, industry credentials, and internships.

At the Providence convening, participants were able to see these kinds of innovative efforts in action on a tour to the Davies Career and Technical High School, which houses the nation’s first in-school mock CVS pharmacy. Davies designed this in partnership with CVS to give students hands-on training by the time they graduate from high school. Many of these students have summer jobs with CVS and plan to continue their pharmacy studies after high school.

Additionally, this summer, the PrepareRI Internship Program will kick off its pilot year by training and placing at least 100 students in paid internships with the state’s top employers in a range of industries. With funding from the Governor’s Workforce Board, and support from our New Skills for Youth initiative, the team in Rhode Island brought in an intermediary, Skills for Rhode Island’s Future, to facilitate the internship program and to help forge stronger connections between education and industry.

Career pathways and internship programs like the ones here in Rhode Island have real-world positive impacts on students. Research and anecdotal evidence show us that investing in career readiness is good for students. In fact, 75 percent of students who complete a career pathway go on to enroll in college. But this work is good for businesses, too; it’s a win-win. Industry leaders know that the jobs they need to fill require skilled workers.

Why not take an active role in training that next generation of employees?

If you’re a business leader in Rhode Island, I challenge you to think about how you can support students like Ty’Rell and the great work already happening in your state’s schools. Whether your investment is with money, advice or time, I urge you to learn more about PrepareRI and contact the team at Skills for Rhode Island’s Future to figure out your first step.

Jennie Sparandara is the executive director of global philanthropy for JPMorgan Chase.

 

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Thanks to the Providence Journal for coming out last week to see what the Skills RI and PrepareRI work-readiness bootcamp was all about:

PROVIDENCE — Imagine having to sell yourself in three minutes. It’s called an elevator pitch and it’s an exercise perfected by most business school students, marketers and salespeople.

On Friday, a dozen junior high school students squeezed into an overheated classroom at Rhode Island College and prepared to be critiqued.

They are part of a larger cohort of 150 juniors from Newport to North Providence who competed for summer jobs with some of Rhode Island’s best-known companies — CVS, Hasbro, Gilbane, Citizens Bank and others. During the past week, the students, who were selected from an applicant pool of 620 teenagers, participated in a boot camp where they learned business skills, among them, public speaking, problem-solving, effective communication and so on.

The program is sponsored by PrepareRI and offers juniors paid six- to eight-week internships.

The camp culminated with Friday’s elevator pitch, an opportunity for teenagers to describe their strengths, which they had previously identified by taking a 170-question survey.

Janessa Diaz, a junior at Rogers High School in Newport, said she was surprised to learn that what she thought were her weaknesses — strong communications skills, empathy — were actually her strengths.

Nina Pande, executive director of Skills for Rhode Island’s Future, the group that organized the summer internship program, and Kiara Butler, CEO of Diversity Talks, provided constructive feedback.

“I know you know this material,” Pande said to Diaz, who was nervous. “Own it.”

“There were moments when you were looking for words,” Butler added. “Tell me a story.”

Daniela Acarapi of North Providence, a recent arrival from Bolivia, did just that.

When a family couldn’t pull together enough money for their daughter’s hip surgery, Acarapi and a friend began fundraising. Although they fell short of their goal, she said the challenge was a lesson in setting goals.

She also described a less successful effort to master English, where she had to swallow her pride and ask for help. After her speech, Butler said, “I liked your level of vulnerability.”

“But I was distracted by the slides,” said Pande, who then encouraged Acarapi to use her bilingualism as an asset.

Jenny King of Lincoln High School said she was disappointed that so many of her strengths fell within one category, the softer skills. None were in strategic thinking. Armed with this knowledge, she is now considering a career in communications. Butler urged her to use the full five minutes allotted for her pitch, while Pande said she left some important information on the table.

After the pitches were over, several students shared their biggest takeaway from boot camp. They all agreed that the sessions devoted to discovering their strengths were the most helpful.

Cameron Borges, who plans to become a software developer, said he felt honored to be here, calling the opportunity “a blessing for me.”

“I love to succeed,” the Newport teenager said. “Finding out that that was my biggest talent was the most wonderful experience.”

Ethan Savoie, of North Smithfield, said the boot camp pushed him out of his middle-class comfort zone.

“I was sitting alone and a few girls of color wanted to know if I’d sit with them,” he said. “We talked about how they live. There were differences but there were also similarities in our lives.”

David Cournoyer wants to be a flight nurse. During boot camp, he had a chance to speak with two top executives from CVS, who told him that the company offers nursing scholarships. That conversation and the whole concept of networking was a revelation.

“I’m going to try and get one of those.”

The program, in its first year, is funded by grants from the Governor’s Workforce Board and New Skills for Youth.

— lborg@providencejournal.com

(401) 277-7823

 

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