Lucas Steffen of Eden is pictured with a VR headset as part of an excavator training simulation at Construction Career Days. Steffen is a Construction Technology student at Ormsby.
LAKE VIEW — Hundreds of high schoolers sporting bright yellow hard hats dotted the sprawling IUOE Local 17 training grounds in Lake View for the 16th annual Western New York Construction Career Days.
The popular event brings together students and professionals and has long been billed as a way for juniors and seniors to learn about the host of career opportunities in the construction industry. It also provides several hands-on activities such as heavy equipment operation, bricklaying, welding, painting, and carpentry.
Erie 2-Chautauqua-Cattaraugus BOCES students from the Ormsby, LoGuidice, and Hewes educational centers recently attended the two-day Construction Career Days. Organizers with the International Union of Operating Engineers estimated that about 1,000 students throughout Western New York would visit the training grounds this year.
In addition to the hands-on activities, students were able to learn about different equipment and the new technology being utilized in the construction of highways and buildings. College representatives and employers also made themselves available to the high school students inside the ground’s training center.
“I thought there were a lot of good things they had set up that show the different opportunities out there,” said Cole Johnson, a senior in the Conservation and Natural Resources Management program at Hewes.
Elliemay Klubek of North Collins Central School and a Conservation student at Ormsby is pictured at a welding demonstration at Construction Career Days.
Johnson has been debating a career in construction. However, after attending Career Construction Days, he did note, “This kind of opened up my eyes to some other things, too.”
Greyson Lewis, also a Conservation student at Hewes, was able to operate a crane during the center’s visit to Lake View.
“It was pretty easy,” said Lewis, who is thinking about becoming a crane operator. “We use excavators at school a lot, so it’s kind of similar to that.”
Scott Farr, a Conservation instructor at the Ormsby Educational Center, said Construction Career Days opens students up to some of the jobs they may encounter in the industry.
It also allows them to meet with potential employers as well as union and college representatives.
“There’s a lot of different avenues for them here to kind of dabble in and see what piques their interest,” Farr said.
The annual event, Farr added, allows Career & Technical Education students to observe a broad range of trade jobs, such as welding, bricklaying, and equipment operation, they may not get to experience in their own program.
That was certainly the draw for Alex Kuhn, a senior in Ormsby’s Welding/Metal Fabrication program.
“It was good to find out about the different opportunities that I have after school and just to meet some of the guys that represent them,” Kuhn said.
Jeff Angeletti and Chris Hy, Conservation instructors at Hewes, have been big supporters of Construction Career Days and its benefits to high schoolers.
“It’s a great way to expose students to so much that ties into what we teach and on the equipment side,” Hy said. “But there are other components, too, that make up the construction industry, like concrete, welders, iron workers, masons, carpenters, and so on.”
Angeletti was thankful to the event’s organizers and its mission to introduce students to the construction industry.
“They get some first-hand experience with some pieces of equipment and talk to people in the trades,” he said.
Career & Technical Education programming typically serves students in their junior and senior years of high school, with students selecting the option to attend an E2CCB CTE program in their sophomore year. For more information, visit e2ccb.org.