CAWP and Children’s Museum Celebrate Careers in Construction Week

The weeklong event, October 13-17, 2008, consisted of daily workshops utilizing CAWP-sponsored Build Up! Toolkits. Children visiting the museum had explored construction through multimedia presentations and hands-on activities, including building roads, bridges, and buildings to construct a model city in the workshop.  A front loader, provided by CAWP associate member Cleveland Brothers Equipment Co., greeted visitors entering the museum, allowing them to climb aboard and explore a piece of construction equipment firsthand. The week’s activities began with a visit from Bob Gibson, Heavy/Highway Training Coordinator for the Carpenters Joint Apprenticeship and Training Program.  Gibson gave children at the museum an opportunity to learn about how our roads, highways and bridges are constructed by showing them the role of carpenters in building and maintaining our infrastructure.  He helped to conduct an interactive session with the children using Build Up!   Tuesday morning’s workshop included a visit from Crane Instructor Jim Haitz of the Western Pennsylvania Operating Engineers Joint Apprenticeship Program.  Children visiting the museum could put on a hardhat and operate a toy crane to pick up and move a cardboard beam into place, illustrating the use of cranes and the role of operators in heavy and highway construction. Throughout the week, CAWP contractor and associate members served as construction industry ambassadors by participating in the activities, which highlighted the importance of safety and education to the construction industry.  CAWP members participating included CAWP President Jack Gulisek, Jr., of John Gulisek Construction Company, CAWP Education Committee Chair John Maffeo, Jr., of Trumbull Corporation, and CAWP Education Committee member Jim Weaver of Jeff Zell Consultants.  CAWP Director of Industry Relations Jason Koss, who also took part in the activities, said, “Through the use of Build Up! toolkits, children can learn how to build bridges and buildings by engaging in a hands-on project, which reinforces skills such as math and science, and promotes future careers in construction.” AGC of America again sponsored its very successful Festival of the Building Arts at the National Building Museum as part of the Careers in Construction Week. National Careers in Construction Week is a nationwide campaign, sponsored by the National Center for Construction Education and Research (NCCER), designed to increase public awareness of the hard work and contributions of our nation’s craft professionals and emphasizes the role construction industry partners play in helping youths and adults achieve career success. CAWP’s collaboration with the Children’s Museum of Pittsburgh for Careers in Construction Week was a fun and interactive way to help introduce the region’s future workforce to the vital role of the construction industry.