JACKSONVILLE — With spring break over and summer on its way, many high school seniors are contemplating what next year will bring. Many are headed to colleges and universities across the state and country, but that’s not the road for everyone.
Trade schools, often a preferable alternative to a typical four-year school, provide students with the specific training they need to succeed in their chosen field, and many employers in those trade industries are looking for new workers.
“[When talking with high-schoolers], I’ll get into electrician [work], plumbing, truck driving,” said Alice Obenshain, director of the Arkansas Welding Academy in Jacksonville. “All of these are trades that are in high demand. Welding is just one trade. We need all of them for society.”
The Arkansas Welding Academy is going through a growth spurt, adding buildings to the campus and increasing its workspace to accommodate more students.
Once it is all said and done, the four stages of the Arkansas Welding Academy’s expansion will total $1.4 million, Obenshain said. Currently, the school can host up to 30 students at one time, but after the expansion is done, the school will be able to accommodate 50.
Welding is one of those trades that is in high demand, Obenshain said. The election of President Donald Trump has helped the industry because pipelines are moving forward, and there is talk of moving a lot of manufacturing from other countries back to the United States, she said.
“Eighty percent of things manufactured in the United States have a welding component,” Obenshain said. “If [Trump] is wanting to drive manufacturing up, if he wants to turn on some gas lines, welding comes up.”
According to the American Welding Society, the industry will need more welders as the baby boomers who took up the trade near retirement.
“That’s why welding is in such high demand,” Obenshain said. “Just going for a ride by Fourche Dam Pike in Little Rock or any industrial area, you’re going to see ‘welders wanted’ and ‘welders needed.’”
In an immediate example of the need for welders, Obenshain said she sometimes hears from companies that want to hire graduates in welding as soon as possible.
“Trinity Industries — they’re a railcar manufacturer — was just here,” she said. “In 2015, after some big train wrecks, the [Department of Transportation] has written new regulations and rules. [Trinity] is having to retrofit railcars with safety measures, and they were in earlier saying they needed 50 welders right now.”
Students at the Arkansas Welding Academy work through a five-month immersive program to get them ready for the workforce. Obenshain said an average of 88 percent of students who start the program end up finishing on time, and of that group, there is a 92 percent job placement rate in jobs with an average salary of $27 per hour.
In five months, students at the Arkansas Welding Academy will spend 720 hours welding.
“When you’re looking at training, what are we training them to do?” Obenshain asked. “At the end of the day, you can have all the certifications, all of the licensures, all of the diplomas, but if you can’t drop your hood and give me a weld that I can visually accept and then test, what good is the program?
“That’s our end goal — getting you into a job as quickly as possible in an industry that’s in high demand.”
For more information about the Arkansas Welding Academy, visit www.arkansasweldingacademy.com.