This article is first in five-part In-Demand Jobs Week series sponsored by OhioMeansJobs.com. Each story will spotlight a different industry and feature people thriving in high-demand jobs in North Central Ohio.
Earlier this morning, much like many other 20 year olds, Colton Moore got ready to complete another day of a four-year learning track. His experience, however, is much different.
As a second year masonry apprentice, he will get paid to learn. And he’s guaranteed a full-time position upon completion.
That’s because Moore is two years into completing the apprenticeship masonry program on his way to becoming a journeyman mason with Local 40 International Union of Bricklayers & Allied Craftworkers (BAC Local 40).
“I was actually going to go to college until the summer after my senior year,” Moore said. “Then I sat back and realized, ‘Why go into debt when I didn’t have to?’”
He set out on a four-year program to become a journeyman mason and has thus far found his own rewarding career in masonry.
BAC Local 40 represents nine counties across North Central Ohio. Their workday finds them primarily commercial construction sites across the state. When masons arrive, the site is often composed of a single hole in the earth. For the duration of the project, Moore and his coworkers can be found in the mud laying foundational block for an office space or high atop gymnasium walls of a new school project.
The apprentice’s role in this process is to learn both skill and procedure. From working with bearing plates to specific cuts in the block, his job is to build both skill and knowledge of the trade.
Simply defined, masonry work includes working with bricks, concrete blocks, concrete, and natural and manmade stones. Thus, the job does come with physical demands. The United State Bureau of Labor outlines, “The work is physically demanding because masons lift heavy materials and often must stand, kneel and bend for long periods. Poor weather conditions may reduce work activity because masons usually work outdoors.”
Yet with all those challenges comes a reward, Matt McClester, Local #40 field representative, notes that the skilled trades – especially his field masonry – has an element of deep satisfaction.
“For a bricklayer, there’s a lot of satisfaction in the fact that you’re building something and at the end of the day you can turn around and see what you did,” McClester said. “You can drive around Ohio and see things that you built.”
And the compensation is spelled out clearly for prospective masonry apprentices. A wage scale at a commercial rate from BAC Local 40 says the four year track compensation will progress from $16.42 – $27.47 per hour. And that total doesn’t include the fringe benefits including healthcare, a state pension and schooling.
When fringe benefits are included, the total compensation package for an apprenticeship program is valued at $35.89 per hour in year one and increases every year to reach $49.94 per hour in year four of the program. Obtaining journeyperson status in masonry will make the graduating apprentices eligible for $29.86 per hour in wages and $49.33 per hour in total compensation.
With that ample schedule of benefits, the skilled trades face a looming challenge: they need more applicants to the program and ultimately, more skilled workers in the field.
And that is perhaps the most prominent challenge facing skilled trades. On Manpower Group’s 2016/2017 U.S. Talent Shortage Survey, skilled trades ranks No. 1 on the list of most difficult jobs to fill and now has held that position for five straight years. North Central Ohio is not immune, but has ample opportunity is a variety of fields.
In the same building as Moore, Zach Winnings and Tory Gorka are in the second and third year respectively of their electrician apprenticeship programs. They are in a five-year apprenticeship to journeyperson track that will see them become journeyperson electricians with the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW Local 688).
“Electricians are one of the first ones on the job and usually the last ones off,” said Carl Neutzling, business manager for IBEW Local 688. Their daily work varies. From pulling high gauge cable in order to power a building to installing the final light fixtures before a building’s grand opening.
“I’ve always enjoyed working with my hands. And people who pushed college – it just didn’t make that much sense to me,” Winning said. ‘But the fact that I get to work with my hands and learn something that I’m going to use everyday is extremely rewarding and it’s an incentive to keep me coming back.”
Winnings, Gorka and their fellow apprentices will complete 10,000 hours over the course of the five-year program. They too receive wages, full benefits and accrue toward their pension while building skill for their full time position. And in the short term and coming years, their work is heavily in demand and from the perspective of apprentices, it comes highly recommended.
“For anyone thinking about (skilled trades) I would think it is a very good idea,” Winnings said . “The fact that when I’m 22 I could be making $28/$29 an hour without a college degree… and debt free: nobody can beat that.”
To learn about interships in the state of Ohio visit this link:
You can find the national BAC program here: http://www.bacweb.org/train_edu_safety/education/index.php For more information locally call (419) 526-5571.
To learn more about the local IBEW 688 program visit: http://www.ibew688.org/Training.html
