SHED Featured In St. Louis Post-Dispatch

For two class periods every Monday and Wednesday morning, students in the construction technology class have been rebuilding a deck that the city had once condemned in a homeowner’s backyard.

“I like moving around a lot and helping people out, so this fits perfectly,” said senior Kylin Fisher, 18. “It feels good building something from the ground up.”

The class taught by Stephen Wurst uses a curriculum produced by the United Brotherhood of Carpenters trade union that includes skills such as demolition, design, welding and woodworking. University City — along with school districts across the country — has added career training programs alongside college-ready curriculum to give students more options and employers a skilled workforce of high school graduates.

After graduation, the students in Wurst’s class qualify for a three-week program through the St. Louis Carpenters Union Training Center that guarantees an apprentice job in the industry.

“The perception is changing,” Wurst said. “These kids are saying it with pride — ‘I’m a carpenter.’”

This year, the students teamed with University City-based Sustainable Housing and Equitable Development. The nonprofit organization known as SHED has a crew of volunteer and union contractors who work on home improvement projects in the city’s third ward.

“Any opportunities we can get to give these kids hands-on, fieldwork experience is closer to real-world job training,” said Adam Brown, the nonprofit’s organization’s executive director. “It’s exciting to know they get to experience the pride you take in seeing something come together, and it’s particularly cool that it’s for a community member.”

In the fall semester, the class built a concession stand/first aid station for the high school. The deck for Shirl Finney is the first class project in the community.

University City cited Finney, 57, last year for safety violations because of the deck’s warped and disintegrating wood. She found out on the city’s website about the SHED program, which helps residents meet health and safety codes without charge.

The refurbished deck will include a bench, lattices and sunshade.

“U. City’s been good to me,” Finney said.

She graduated from the high school as did her two children. One of the students working on the deck played at her house as a toddler in the neighborhood.

“I let them all come here and play,” she said.

When the students started the deck project at the beginning of the year, they were bundled up in the cold. The rainy spring delayed some of the work. With only a couple class periods left in the school year, the students likely will spend several days of their summer vacation finishing the deck.

“I’m learning life skills,” said sophomore Dallas Hill, 16. “Even if I don’t go into carpentry, I can still use this and I don’t have to pay anybody.”

Reprinted from the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. Read the original story here.