Where do I begin?

- An apprenticeship program can help you learn whatever craft you're going for. With us you can learn brick laying, you can learn tile setting, you can learn restoration, terrazzo and also marble. There's several different crafts to give you to become a journeyman in those crafts. - With our program about 95% of the learning is actually done in the field and about 5 to 7% is actually learned in our facility. - Our entry-level program is our Finisher program. it's a one year program, 2,000 hours out in the field, 144 hours of related training. It could take as little as one year to get through that, it may be 18 months to get through. It's all depending on your hours that you work. Once you finish that program you have an opportunity to roll over into one of our other crafts. You have to complete that program. For the bricklayers, for instance, you're going to be in that program for another three years. So, from start to finish with a bricklayer it's going to be 8,000 hours and 144 hours each year. PCC, tile setters, terrazzo, that's a little bit shorter it'll be three years from start to finish or 6,000 hours, 144 hours each year to get through those programs. So, depending on your program, the length of time's going to differ and also there's a different pay scale for each craft. - As far as what we do in here, we just try to slow it down so that they can get the actual knowledge base of how to actually approach laying brick. Out in the field it's so repetitious in such a hurried, fast pace, that the apprentices don't actually get to use their tools very much, as far as on the job. So, we give them that opportunity in here. Which kind of helps them in their overall goal of being a mason. - Passed on from generation to generation that's how that work ethic, the job skills, that's how it gets passed down from year to year. - In the apprenticeship classes we do this very same thing that they do out in the field. The only thing we do in here is actually work with them with a little bit a curriculum on you know math skills because we're finding that the math skills are pretty low. - Because it's an earn while you learn program, so you come to work for one of our contractors and you're going to be collecting a paycheck all the way through. You also do most of your learning is going to happen on the job site with journeymen that are craftspeople of whatever trade they're in. Also you're going to do classroom training also which will happen here at our facility. Being one of the craftspeople in our trade, brings many benefits. I mean, so you get a living wage job. You can support a family on that. You can buy your first house. And then also the benefit side, so there's also retirement there's three different retirements the bricklayers have. And that's going to help you that when your body gets broke down after 30, 35 years in this craft that you're going to have that retirement to fall back on. Healthcare for you and your family. So, those are huge, important things that this craft will give you to make sure you can last 30, 35 years in this trade. We also need people that are physically fit. They have some math skills behind them. I'm not talking about complicated math skills, basic math, need to know how to read a tape measure, that's really important. Any you kind of have to be a little bit of an adrenaline junkie, because where we perform our work is on the outside of buildings. So you're going to be working at heights. So if your are deathly afraid of heights this is probably not a right career to go into. First of all, the minimum requirement is 18 years of age. You come in here, fill out your application. We do interviews usually around monthly. So, you'll be sent a letter saying this is your interview date. You come in here and you interview. That score is going to put you on what's called our rank pool. Depending on how you score, that's the number that you're going to be put on that rank pool. Number one gets the chance to go work first and then two, three, four and so on. It's a pretty easy process through us. - Well once they're accepted, it actually, it opens their eyes really, really quickly because they go to work right away. There is no classroom experience until they've gone to work. - We're going to put you with a contractor, we give you a set of tools and then we're going to send you to work for that contractor. They're going to send you to some safety classes, probably, before you go on the job site. Then you're going to go out and work alongside those journeymen and learning the craft. We start you out slow, we know you're coming in not knowing anything about construction and you're nervous and, you know, all that stuff. But, I mean, you'll get to know those guys when your working side by side. And like I said, and then you're off and running. - We want people that like to be outdoors and want to work with their hands. Because, mostly, that's what we do. Everything we do is with our hands and our backs. - If I was going to give somebody advice, really study what you want to do. Really sit down and look at it. Investigate all the other trades and try to figure out if masonry is really the one for you. If you don't like it you can get out of it and move to another trade, but you kind of need to figure that out right away. If you don't figure that out right away you're going to be stuck in something that you're not going to like to do for the rest your life. But perseverance and having that steady mind to get through it is is where it's at.