The North Dakota Construction Leadership Council (NDCLC) recently held its annual demo day event at the Red River Valley Fairgrounds, teaching students about their options in the construction fields.
The event gives students an opportunity to get hands on with the equipment with the help from local construction workers. About 100 students from across the Red River Valley showed up for this year’s demo day.
“It’s an opportunity for all the area local high school students and college students to come out and try their hand at running some heavy equipment that you see behind us,” said Craig Griesbach, NDCLC, in a statement. “They got a chance to look at some survey equipment, some drones, and just explore some of the different careers available in the construction industry.”
Students were able to operate heavy equipment, including dozers, skid steers, cranes and excavators. Organizers say demo day is a way for the industry to recruit workers early.
“We’ve actually had a lot of recruiting efforts out of it,” said Griesbach. “We catch them as early as sophomores in high school. It gives them an opportunity to explore what is out there for them, and then they reach out to several companies here and then they find out how they can get involved in the industry.”
“It’s just to show them that there’s opportunities out there for them and to show them a real path going forward,” said another NDCLC spokesperson, in a statement. “So, there’s different schools in our area that have heavy equipment operation programs that we can talk about and the different union opportunities.”
The NDCLC members don’t limit their education to equipment operation, rather they divulge the various paths available to students interested in the trades.
“What our chaperone’s are doing here, they’re with the companies they’re operators, they’re sales representatives, and they can really highlight to the students the career paths that are available.”
Students also got the chance to learn about new construction technology. Organizers say, of course, everything was done safely with the proper shoes and eye-protection.
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Source: Valleynewslive.com, KVRR.com
