Academy in the News
YourHub
During the turbulent times of COVID, the Colorado Homebuilding Academy (CHA) has erected pop-up construction training centers in local communities. The most recent, in the Reunion development in Commerce City, is helping train 25 people who are learning construction skills in the hopes of securing a job in the booming homebuilding industry.
CNBC
The coronavirus pandemic hit Joshua Copeland and his industry hard. The 38-year-old chef contracted Covid-19 last spring, losing his sense of taste and smell, which are critical to anyone in his line of work.
FOX31
At the Colorado Homebuilding Academy in Denver the first thing you will hear are the sounds of construction. For 31-year-old Gabriel Lara, they are the sounds of success.
Our Community Now
Stay “essential” by taking this free online course in construction.
The Gazette
In high school, nobody discussed the trades as a career, Persephone Parker says.
Our Community Now
Colorado construction workers are always needed—pandemic or no pandemic.
Colorado Builder
Now’s a good time for builders to evaluate training for themselves and their crews
Denver Post
Industry, job seekers hope home building can lead way in economic recovery
Results Lab
We are all living in uncertain times. The current situation is chaotic, and no one knows what this means for our organizations and the communities we serve. Existing organizational models have been disrupted, and we need a way to navigate through this.
Builder and Developer
Colorado Homebuilding Academy (CHA) is offering two 2-week online “Basics in Electrical” courses to offer students a unique way to learn the basics of electricity which will help them secure jobs now or post COVID.
Vincent Salandro, Remodeling
The organization has shifted its 16-session boot camp program into a three-week, online program.
Erin Shine, Founder at Attainable Home
A few months back I was looking for different ways to sharpen my knowledge of home building and construction skills in order to help to build more attainable housing here in the Denver metro area.
North Alabama Homebuilding Academy
One month after opening, the North Alabama Homebuilding Academy in Huntsville, Ala., already had more than 440 students on a waiting list for the free, hands-on training aimed at opening the door to a career in the building trades.
DoBizLo
CBS Denver Showcased Colorado Homebuilding Academy’s Career Options for Homeless & Low-Income Population. Colorado Homebuilding Academy recognizes Denver’s need for skilled labor with a multitude of construction projects all over the metro area.
Denver Business Journal
“I’m the poster child for opportunity in the industry.” That’s what Cheryl Schuette, acting director of Colorado Homebuilding Academy, said of her journey through the homebuilding industry. She began as a secretary at Village Homes and eventually worked her way up to chief operating officer and president.
The Denver Post
The home construction industry has created the Colorado Homebuilding Academy, where young adults are informed of careers in the skilled trades that don’t require a college degree but pay well…
Builder
Builders like Pat Hamill, who founded the Colorado Homebuilding Academy to reinvest in the training and education of new talent in the home building community. The Academy offers hands-on learning, classroom teaching and real-life experience with the ultimate goal of job placement and ongoing support for its students.
ABC 15 Arizona
Right now, homebuilders around the country are desperately looking for workers to help them complete projects. There are nearly 200,000 construction jobs available right now across the nation, up 81 percent in just two years.One homebuilder is taking matters into its own hands.
CGTN
Class is in session at the Colorado Homebuilding Academy. 20 students, chainsaws in hand, are halfway through an eight-week construction skills bootcamp. Michael Smith is in charge of the academy, with a mission of preparing students, many of whom come from very different fields, to work in the construction industry.
NBR
Washington Post
Oakwood Homes, a home builder headquartered in Denver, has create a foundation that funds a new construction school. It’s called the Colorado Homebuilding Academy. Students can enroll in a free, eight-week “boot camp” to learn how to saw, tile, drill, plaster and paint and a bunch of other skills they need to enter the construction industry.
CNBC
Inside an unassuming warehouse on the outskirts of Denver, 18 students are learning to saw, tile, drill, plaster and paint. They are mastering how to build a house. While that number might not sound like a lot, today’s homebuilders are desperate for all of them.
Also published in: NBR
CBS Denver
If there’s one thing Alexis Monserrate has, it’s vision. That’s why she came here all the way from New York for the Colorado Homebuilding Academy.“In eight weeks they really got me market-ready. Learning everything from how to read a tape measure to using power tools. It also gave me the confidence to apply for jobs like this.”
Fox News
Colorado Homebuilding Academy is a nonprofit operating in industry-donated space. Builders and grants foot the $1,400 cost of Construction Skills Boot Camp for each student who pledges to go into construction…administrators are hoping to get more women in the program. They are seeking high school graduates not bound for college, military veterans returning to civilian life and previous criminal offenders. The school expects to triple its number of graduates this year.
Builder
This year, through Oakwood’s philanthropic arm, Pat Hamill created the Colorado Homebuilding Academy, a nonprofit educational resource that provides hands-on training and job placement for workers, job seekers, and students through its own classes and partnerships with the University of Denver and Community College of Aurora. Michael Smith, the academy’s director, says the home building industry has utterly failed to attract millennials.
Denver 7
In just five weeks, Nathaniel Baldwin has come a long way from the information technology work he once knew.”I was the one that kind of kept all the servers running, kept all the websites up, that sort of thing,” Baldwin described. Today, instead of servers, he’s learning to run power tools at Colorado Homebuilding Academy.
Colorado Public Radio
Houses along the Front Range can’t be built fast enough. Part of the problem is a booming population. There’s also a shortage of construction workers to get the job done. The Colorado Homebuilding Academy is an effort to get more people to work.
Also published in: The Denver Post and Coloradoan
The Denver Post
In a large warehouse that smells of freshly cut wood in north Denver, 20 adults — including a refugee family from Somalia, a math teacher and a laid-off retail worker — gather in the unfinished frame of a house to take notes on the Pythagorean theorem.
MORE PRESS FEATURES:
Home Builder Academy Hopes To Ease Construction Labor Shortage | CBS Denver
Hacen falta 10,000 trabajadores de construcción en Denver | Telemundo Denver
Colorado in dire need of skilled construction workers | Fox 31 Denver
Colorado’s construction landscape currently understaffed by 10,000 workers | 9 News Colorado
The brave new world of construction recruiting | Construction Dive
Make a Living Building Homes | NAHB Now
Colorado industry leaders launch home building academy | Builder
Burns School of Real Estate and Construction Management establishes Home Builders Academy | University of Denver
Ultra-low construction unemployment a drag on state economy | The Denver Post
Tiny house leads to big lessons for Cherry Creek students | The Denver Post
Arapahoe/Douglas county workforce center’s industry academies work to put young people to work | The Denver Post