Professional Builders Group Addresses Worker Shortage

There’s a crisis in the construction industry — a shortage of skilled construction craftsmen.

Although the shortage exists nationwide, it is especially acute in Northwest Arkansas due to the work that is anticipated with our continued growth. There are just not enough trained equipment operators, carpenters, concrete finishers, masons, steelworkers, roofers, drywall men, flooring installers, painters, pipefitters, plumbers, heating and air-conditioning mechanics, and electricians to complete the work in a productive and efficient manner.

In times past, these skills were passed from generation to generation. But within the last decade or two, the construction industry has failed to attract the young people necessary to meet the ever-present needs. In 1997, only 10.9 percent of the employed construction craftspeople were under the age of 30. Consistent growth is dependent on the continued availability of these practitioners of the world’s oldest professional — after all, everything around us had to be built by someone.

The construction industry, again especially in NWA, needs help. We need young people. With all the construction and growth of the region, it should be obvious that there is real opportunity available. There are certainly college-education professional positions, such as architects, engineers, accountants, construction managers, etc., available in the construction industry, and students are encouraged to pursue careers.

But these aren’t the only avenues to success. Like most careers today, construction crafts are more technically challenging, utilizing lasers, computers, sophisticated building mechanical, security and electrical systems as well as complicated analysis of construction means and methods. High school students, parents, school counselors and teachers should consider the myriad opportunities available within the construction field when reviewing vocational alternatives.

The construction industry has a problem — but it also has a solution. The Associated Building Contractors organization, through its merit shop advocacy, has opened the construction trades as they have never been open before. As recently as 20 years ago, entry into most skilled construction trades was passed within immediate and extended families or within closely aligned cliques and was rarely available to minorities or women. In other words, you had to be male and know someone. This is no longer the case. Referral is available to all, as guaranteed by statute, through employers who have the need and the means.

ABC has been actively involved in construction-craft training since 1979 and has graduated several hundred apprentices from different disciplines. In 1994, ABC formed an educational affiliate, the Arkansas Construction Education Foundation, to forward its craft-training mission. ACEF acts as a fund-raising mechanism with the ultimate goal of a self-sustaining endowment and administers apprenticeship training, safety and management education programs for the construction industry. Now the largest single educator of apprentices in Arkansas, ACEF has expanded its services to 11 locations, including Fayetteville and Springdale. For the 1997-98 school year, more than 550 apprentices enrolled for construction-craft training.

The ACEF was recently accredited by the National Center for Construction Education and Research and has maintained the curriculum approval of the U.S. Bureau of Apprenticeship and Training. ACEF has also developed a master plan and established a series of goals to further its efforts to recruit, educate and train young people to fill the immediate and future skilled craft needs of the construction industry. Capital fund-raising campaigns have been initiated to:

n Build and maintain training centers in Arkansas communities, including NWA;

n Develop a viable “school-to-work” program to allow qualified high school graduates to enter ACEF programs as second-year apprentices;

n Provide NCCER certification of programs at vocational and technical post-secondary schools.

The ACEF craft-training programs in NWA are supervised by the Craft Education Committee of the ABC Northwest Council. As committee chairman, I have witnessed years of service by the committee members and program instructors, which has strengthened and extended first ABC and now ACEF efforts. Currently, carpentry programs are available in Fayetteville, six electrical classes are meeting in Springdale and a sheet metal mechanic class meets in Rogers.

As we approach May 1998 high school graduation, ABC/ACEF and the NWA construction industry encourage students, parents, school counselors and teachers to consider this very viable vocational opportunity to assure the future growth and potential for our area. n

David Hansen is chairman of the ABC Northwest Council’s Craft Education Committee and vice president of Heckathorn Construction Co.t