Climbing the hvac ladder

I have read with great interest your “Feedback” in The News. The letter from Dick Shaw [July 24, 2000, page 5] was of great concern to me. The company I work for takes great interest in trying to help young people come into the trades of hvac and plumbing. We make our personnel available to any high school that would like to have us speak to the students. I feel that the real problem is in the schools — they say all the students should go to college. I see a great many kids that are not college material every day that are unhappy with their jobs. The challenges are to get the schools to look at each student as not one type of person but many different people. It took myself several years before I realized that I needed something that I would be willing to do for the rest of my life.

We as a whole must be willing to take these young people that are coming out of the trade schools and spend the time and money to get them to where they can be good techs and a benefit to the trades. If we want to start teaching our own hires to be techs, we will be spending more than we can afford to as companies.

The trade schools are just the first steps to higher learning. We are the ladder that they need to climb to reach higher in life.

Dave Hurrle Earl Gray & Sons, Inc. Board Member of the Indianapolis PHCC