One of the greatest needs in today’s construction industry is for qualified workers. Across all sectors of the business, from engineers to foremen and craft workers, the workforce is aging and there seem to be few young workers ready to take their place. A roundtable at the ASCC Construction Executive Leadership Conference in July focused on changing the perception of construction for young people to, as AGC states on its website, “show them the exciting world of construction before we are discarded as a career choice.” The Construction Users Roundtable (CURT) has hosted an event to explore ways to find and develop new leaders. And the National Center for Construction Education and Research (NCCER) is mounting an advertising campaign called Build Your Future to convince young people that construction offers great opportunities. NCCER, working with CURT, also has developed the Contractors Workforce Development Assessment, a tool to measure commitment to workforce development. Our industry is finally getting serious about this!

Tilt-Up Summit

As commercial concrete construction work heats up, tilt-up is grabbing a bigger chunk of the work than ever. If you’re doing tilt-up or want to start doing tilt-up, there’s no place better to learn about it than at the TCA Annual Convention in San Jose, Calif., Sept. 29 to Oct. 1. Mitch Bloomquist and his team have lined up an impressive group of technical and business speakers and are even planning an international reception in the top of the TransAmerica Pyramid in downtown San Francisco. For more information or to register, go to www.tilt-up.org.

Concrete for Community

ASCC’s Decorative Concrete Council staged its annual community project in August at the Good News Day Care Center on Chicago’s South Side. Run by the incredible Ms. Pearl, this center in a rough part of the city provides free daycare to as many as 60 children so their mothers can work and the kids can have a safe haven. ASCC’s Todd Scharich led the team doing the decorative work on the floors using Rachel Bruce’s remarkable multilayer stencils to create a sea turtle, an octopus, and a giant clam (with a pearl). Also assisting were Rick Lobdell (Concrete Mystique), and Neil Roach (Creative Construction by Design). Roach’s company is serving as the GC on the building project. Increte provided a lot of the materials used. For photos, go to CC’s Facebook page or here for a time-lapse video.