When I Grow Up

Text by Becky Hepler

In the quest for upward mobility, children have been counseled to aim higher than their parents in a career path, especially if they are from a family of blue collar workers, with the hopeful result that going to college will be higher pay and less back-breaking work.

This begs the questions:

• Is a kindergarten teacher less tired than a construction worker at the end of the day? • How does the pay of an English major barista stack up with a plumber? • Are the minions in a cubicle farm really happy?

College, in and of itself, is a very worthy goal. It expands horizons, gives critical thinking skills and provides alternative viewpoints, but it’s not the only way to fulfilling work that can support a household. Chris Bennington from Giles County didn’t have any real career goals in mind when he graduated from high school. He patched together a living with jobs in fast food and a stint at Tetra, but adding a wife and family suddenly brought things into focus. He’d heard that a heating and cooling company needed workers, and he got hired. More than 20 years later, he’s still installing and maintaining heating and cooling systems and still loving it. “With me, it’s just getting into the field and having a chance to learn different things, plus work with my hands and be outside,” he says. “Most of the time, those are the most interesting things about it that I enjoy.” He also appreciates that the work includes construction, plumbing, electrical work and even computer technology, with all the diagnostic tools.

“That’s another reason I love it, you get the best of all the worlds in trade.”

Bennington has worked with several different companies and has been at his current place for 13 years. He has no interest in starting and running his own company. “As long as I can support my family and make a good income, I really don’t have to think about having my own business.” He also feels positive about the benefits, which include matching IRA funds, yearly bonuses and an adequate health insurance plan.

Luanda Parrish grew up in her mother’s salon, Lia’s Hair Styling in Blacksburg. She even took cosmetology classes as her Career and Technical Education [CTE] requirement in high school, but never really thought about it as a career, opting, instead, for psychology. But one day it occurred to her, “…psychology seemed a little too heavy for me.” I felt like I wouldn’t be able to separate work and life. I like talking to people, and hair dressing is sort of like doing therapy but a little bit lighter. The more I got into it, the more I started to enjoy it.” Parrish recognizes the drawbacks of her profession and being a business owner in it - the responsibilities of having employees, the longer hours, the need to build a market with a successful brand. But she also enjoys the positive attributes, the creativity, the flexibility of bringing her children and even her dog to work and the satisfaction of working with her mother to continue to build this business. Scott Mattox of Radford always had an appreciation and fascination with old buildings, probably linked to his dad’s stint in the Air Force in Europe where there were plenty of those. He thought he wanted to be an architect, but his high school drafting teacher told him that if he really wanted a job he should consider construction. Knowing how much he enjoyed working with his hands, he decided that was good advice and got into Virginia Tech’s Building Construction

program. Right out of the program he was hired by a crew that was doing historic rehabbing of houses and businesses in Roanoke. He eventually got to be part of the restoration of the Hancock Building in downtown Roanoke, originally a dry goods store in the 1930s. It was purchased by Grand Home Furnishings (formerly Grand Piano and Furniture Company),

who refaced the building to give it a more modern appearance. Removing that facing showed beautiful Art Deco terra cotta work, and a specialist was brought in to teach a hands-on class on fixing the terra cotta and matching the textures with full finish work. “It was a neat project, and we have gone on to similar ones, including one in Danville; that was uplifting an old newspaper office to a boutique hotel,” Mattox explains. Asked the best part of his job, Mattox states: “I think it might be getting a sense of accomplishment, having something you can look at, tangible, see what improvements you’ve made. It gives you an immediate achievement. I don’t know that you get that in a desk job.” Every high school in Virginia has a Career and Technical Education department and students are required, in addition to the usual high school subjects, to take a class in the CTE fields.

In Giles County, the two high schools (Narrows and Giles County) teach their own agriculture, family and consumer sciences and business classes, but the more specialized areas, such as cosmetology, automotive technology, drafting, preengineering, computer technology, cybersecurity, building technology, welding, precision machining and nursing, are taught at the Giles Tech Center. Kevin White, principal of the Tech Center and CTE director for the county school system, says students who do the 2-year sequence of classes and successfully pass the state-certification tests are set to enter these various fields or to go to a community college for further instruction .

White says that the Virginia Department of Education recognizes the seriousness of the skills gap and the shrinking number of people to do these very important – and often very well-paid – jobs. It is stepping up with more money for schools to spend for equipment and curriculum. The state is hiring learning coordinators to improve CTE and work-based learning. The shrinking number of technicians is driving up the cost of getting things done, so these fields can be very lucrative financially as well as offer great personal satisfaction. Tonya Vaden, career counselor for the Giles County school system, thinks the skilled trades are highly overlooked. “I think that it’s so important for people to realize that there is success to be had in every career, and there is success in all walks of life. Each student does not have to fit into a box or

specific path,” she says. “Success is out there, and it can be found in the skilled trades.”