Thousands of students will be laying brick, welding pipe, and hammering nails in London as they try to get a feel for a career in the trades.
Future Building, a unique, interactive three-day tradeshow will welcome roughly 5,000 students from across Ontario to the Metroland Media Agriplex on April 19-21
Sean Strickland, CEO of the Ontario Construction Secretariat, says getting young people interested in the trades is the biggest challenge facing the industry.
"Over the next ten years we need 21,000 new trades people, new apprentices to enter into the construction trade in the province of Ontario," says Strickland. "What Future Building really does is provide exposure to construction trades that many young people do not get in the classrooms. People don't just show up and get a brochure, they get a chance to try their hands at a construction trade."
Carpenters, bricklayers, electricians, cement masons, operating engineers, demolition workers and a variety of others from the Industrial, Commercial and Institutional (ICI) construction industry will all be on hand. They will talk to students about education, training, and job availability and satisfaction.
Strickland says construction provides a secure future for anyone willing to roll-up their sleeves and work for it.
"It's a unionized industry. You have good wages, you have good benefits, you have a pension," says Strickland. "Many of our contractors started as apprentices and now own their own companies. There's also lots of jobs on the management side. You start off as an apprentice, you go onto be a foreman, supervisor, a superintendent, you can get into business development, project management. There's a variety of different career paths that you can take, once you take that first step and get into the construction industry."
Strickland says major projects slated for the near future will provide job opportunities for years to come.
"Bruce Power in Kincardine has a big refurbishment project, which is likely going to start in 2019, which will go on for 15 years," says Strickland. "London and Southwestern Ontario typically provide a lot of that labour force and a lot of those skilled trades and so there's opportunities there as well."
Students attending the career exhibition will come from as far away as Gore Bay, an eight hour bus ride to London.
Last year's event, held in Toronto, drew 10,000 students.
Admission to the tradeshow is free. For more information or to register visit www.futurebuilding.ca.
