With a lot of building projects underway and planned locally, the need for skilled labor is more pressing than ever. An event Friday aims to address that.
Educators and business leaders in recent years have tried to move away from pushing all high school students toward a traditional four-year college.
On Friday the South Bend Regional Chamber and the University of Notre Dame will host a Building Trades Day on campus. Kate Lee, a South Bend school board member, is the chamber’s executive director for education and workforce.
"The building trades are booming and there are multiple things kind of coming together all at once," Lee says. "So we have obviously large building projects with (Amazon Web Services) and the Synergy Cells battery plant, plus Notre Dame always has a lot of building projects going on. Road projects and housing. So all projects large and small that require all the building trades."
That’s the demand for labor rising. Lee says the supply also is declining.
"We're also at a time where a lot of the people that have worked in building trades are nearing retirement age. So it's kind of like this is this moment where there's this sudden urgency to make sure that more young people understand the opportunities and the great benefits of being in the building trades."
The good news, Lee says, is area high schools are seeing more students enrolling in trades programs. About 1,000 of them will attend events at the Stepan Center and tour building projects on campus, and they can talk to representatives from more than 70 businesses.
In an afternoon session, from 2:30 to 5:30, organizers hope to draw trades-curious adults, students who can’t come earlier in the day, and parents who want to learn more.
