Retirement of skilled workers; teachers say it is important to remove the stigma associated with crafts
Efforts to attract local people to skilled crafts continue.
Sault College hosted representatives from several major local employers and took them through the school’s qualified sales labs on Wednesday.
Representatives of Algoma Steel, Tenaris Algoma Tubes, Sault Foundry, PUC Services, China Steel, Rector Machine Works, Arauco and others were present and agreed with Sault College staff that there is a shortage of skilled workers and the need to inform young people – or those who choose a second career – that skilled crafts are a useful option.
Michael Manarino, senior human resources representative at Algoma Steel, said the steel plant needed fresh, qualified professionals because of a number of retirements expected over the next five years.
Both Manarino and Brita Allen, senior manager of industrial relations and training at Tenaris, said young people should know that cleaner technology and robotics have displaced their mills from the harsh working environment known to their grandfathers.
Andrew Sarlo, president and owner of the S. & T. Group, said 7th and 8th graders should now know about the possibilities in skilled crafts.
“Trade is a viable vocation for the future,” Sarlo said.
Sarlo pointed out that many new skilled workers start working in their late 20s, leading to a shortage of such workers as older people retire.
“They don’t start young enough … I have to move faster.”
Larry Girardi, Sault Ste. Marie, deputy CAO for public works and engineering services, said the city needs eight to 10 professionally trained skilled workers.
Tanya Running, Sault College’s Strategic Recruitment Manager, called on employers to spread the message across the community that there are quality instructions for skilled crafts from experienced instructors at Sault College.
“The challenge is to understand that skilled careers are a career option worth thinking about,” said David Orazietti, dean of the Salt College of Aviation, Crafts and Technology, Environment and Business.
“I think it’s so fundamentally important to pass on the message to young people and their parents in our community that there are great paid skilled jobs at Sault Ste. “Marie and Sault College is a great way to get there,” Orazietti told SooToday.
There are reasons for the shortage of skilled craftsmen, say educators.
“Some of them are the expectations that a young person or their parents can expect them to go to university. Interestingly, the number of people who go to university and then come to college continues to grow. Somewhere around 15% of all university graduates now come to college to receive special training in a particular field to improve their employment, ”Orazietti said.
Some students who complete skilled craft programs through college then go on to a university program, such as the one at Lakehead University in Thunder Bay, to earn an engineering degree.
“There is a historical stigma of trade,” Orazietti said.
“Some people think that these are difficult, dirty jobs that are low paid, and that is absolutely not the case. These are high-paying jobs, many of them in a very clean shopping environment. They’re not that far from some office environments in terms of the way they’re arranged, with some of the latest cutting-edge technology in our robotics lab and our electrical labs, so I think part of that breaks down the barriers of thinking that is somewhat historical about how people make skilled crafts. “
“I think it’s starting to change. It has changed over the last decade or more and will continue to change, I believe that when people become more aware and see the possibility that these are real jobs that pay very well with good pension benefits packages in many cases, who you can easily support a family and have a very good quality of life. There are jobs in our community, so if you want to stay at Sault Ste. Marie, where we have a great quality of life, crafts are a great job opportunity, “said Orazietti.
There are approximately 300 students in the college’s skilled programs for postgraduate students, and approximately 500 apprentices pass through the college on an annual basis, Orazietti said.
There is still room for more.
“We can certainly hold more than a thousand. There are vacancies and it is not too late to apply, “Orazietti said.
“I would say the word comes out. We’ve worked hard and people are starting to listen, “said Steve Burmaster, Ontario Youth Apprenticeship Coordinator at the Algoma School Board.
“Parents are great influencers. They were an audience that was difficult to reach, but we worked to reach parents and students at all levels, primary and secondary. This year we have approximately 180 students on cooperative internships related to skilled crafts and we are about to sign 50 of them for apprenticeships right in high school, so they will graduate high school, already registered apprentices, already associated with employers earning a paycheck “We’re working through advisers to get the message out,” Burmaster said.
Both postgraduate and apprenticeship students will receive training at Sault College before joining the workforce.
“Gold-collar quarries are skilled crafts in which people make phenomenal amounts of money. “This stigma still exists a little bit, but it’s changing because people see that they can make $ 150,000 by doing work, and the technology is phenomenal,” Burmaster said.
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