Masonry Magazine March 1980 Page. 10
APPRENTICESHIP & TRAINING
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Line this bubble up between these two marks like so there, it's level.
The insider no doubt remembers how there was more mortar on the boot tops than in the wall at the first coffee break of the first day, can recall the buttering of thousands of bricks and countless mortar beds before the trowel became a tool of proficiency, and would probably just as soon forget how many brick had to be relaid and how many joints tuckpointed to get a plumb wall that would stand in a stiff breeze and look good, too. In short, skill is skill, and it takes experience to get it.
All forms of preapprenticeship training afford hopefuls the opportunity to "try their hand" at the work, to use the essential tools and materials. Many programs go beyond that and offer training equivalent to the experience a third or fourth period apprentice might have acquired.
High schools have long been a source of workers for the masonry trade. More and more of them have developed first-rate vocational programs consistent with the advanced technology found in many phases of construction work. Coming to the realization that college prep courses aren't suitable for many young people, schools have swung to the blue-collar view, a shift which, in effect, elevated many crafts to a professional level. Few schools, however, can afford resident experts in any number of skilled construction occupations on their staffs; if the construction tech instructor happens to have been drawn from the masonry field, the quality of training can be excellent.
Many community colleges, too, have produced programs which provide a background for masonry apprenticeship. Programs lasting from one to two years provide thousands of hours of practical and related theory instruction which is the basis for skilled and productive workers.
Vocational-Technical Training
Vocational-technical institutes have been established in many geographic and skill areas, publicly-funded schools, committed to preparing people for jobs or upgrading the skills of the presently employed. Lay advisory committees, drawing on the expertise of concerned professionals, are in large part responsible for their successes.
Programs which promote excellence in a variety of crafts and professions exist within the public school system as well. One of the largest in scope the Vocational and Industrial Clubs of America (VICA). Organized in 1965, VICA advertises itself as "the only national organization in the U.S. serving trade, industrial, technical and health occupations education students."
VICA operates within secondary and post-secondary education institutions and hosts competitive activities in over 20 different craft and skill areas. Competition begins on a local or club level, and advances to statewide, national and, in some cases, international competition.
VICA has hosted national competition in bricklaying since 1969, when 12 competitors battled for the national championship. In July, 1979, contestants from 30 states were scheduled to take up their trowels in Atlanta, Georgia, and construct a project under close scrutiny from the judges to determine the national champion.
VICA, a non-profit educational association which was sponsored in part by AFL-CIO, among other organizations, claims support from many facets of industry. Four years ago there were 8,000 local clubs, many of which offered masonry programs. It is not known how many of this past decade's VICA participants went on for further training in masonry.
The masonry industry has furthered its own involvement in training through joint sponsorship of Job Corps.
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Centers. Instituted during the Johnson Administration, the centers, situated on lands operated by the Departments of Interior and Agriculture, provide concentrated training for young people in many skill areas. Currently there are 32 centers throughout the U.S. which offer masonry instruction. The International Union of Bricklayers & Allied Craftsmen (BAC) has been involved since 1970.
During the past five years, according to Merlin L. Taylor, executive director of the International Masonry Apprenticeship Trust (IMAT), the education and training division of the organized industry. Job Corps graduates have been placed in joint apprenticeship programs in the following numbers: 1975, 119; 1976, 124; 1977, 132: 1978, 214.
A substantial number also join the military from the centers and return to continue their masonry training in local joint programs.
Taylor explained that each of the 37 masonry instructors at the centers is responsible for training 18 to 20 youths, figures which would push the overall training to nearly 750 preapprentices per year.
Angel Job Corps Center, on the Oregon coast, hosts a typical-if smaller-masonry operation. Drawing appli-
Angel Job Corps Center Instructor Ken Bader.
cants from Oregon, Washington, Idaho and Alaska, instructor Ken Bader advises and supervises work in block, brick, rock and tile. The program is a one-year, 1,000-hour comprehensive course in the craft, with time divided almost equally between the various work processes and classroom study.
Classes at Angel serve dual roles; they afford some of the students the chance to receive high school GED's and, at the same time, learn many of the technical concepts each trade requires. Bader's students are schooled in blueprint and layout and are required to study IMAT's three-volume Brick and Block Construction set. The preapprentices occasionally leave the center to donate their skills to construction projects for non-profit organizations or senior citizens anything which does not compete with the pri-
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