A Kirkwood Masonry student’s hands rapidly work a brick tower during the SkillsUSA competitions at Jones Hall in April 2013
Kirkwood Masonry Construction program contributes to local and regional growth while building careers with a firm future
For Matt Fish, an investment of less than a year at Kirkwood Community College could pay off for decades to come. The Waterloo area grad has put the skills learned in his Masonry Construction classes to work as an apprentice mason since last summer. Fish is on a training and job growth track that should make him eligible for wages north of $1,000 a week in a few years. But one aspect of his new career has Fish thinking further ahead than wages or advancement.
“It’s pretty satisfying to work on something that you know is going to be there a hundred years from now,” he said.
Matt Fish is one of dozens of recent graduates from the Kirkwood Masonry Construction program, one of many construction-related programs in the college’s Industrial Technologies department. Students learn skills that reach back to the pyramids of Egypt and great European cathedrals, while also reflecting the latest advancements in energy conservation and modern “smart buildings” technologies. Graduates also benefit from an overall demand for valued, hands-on skills to replace a wave of retiring workers from the Iowa and Midwest workforce.
For more than a decade, the Kirkwood Masonry Construction program has been taught by Joe Luchtenburg. He started as a “tender,” assisting union bricklayers the mid-1980s. After completing the industry-led bricklayers’ school in Des Moines, he began work with Seedorf Masonry, one of the state’s leading firms.
“I went on to Journeyman status and got opportunities to work on small residential as well as bigger commercial projects,” Luchtenburg recalls. “It was really worthwhile experience and I learned a lot from great foremen leading and teaching me. I got to be a teacher for the Bricklayers union 15 years ago, then got to know Kirkwood’s program as an adjunct instructor.”
Luchtenburg’s substantial arms open wide to his last point. “Then Kirkwood asked me to come teach full-time. I jumped all over that!”
The veteran professional mason-instructor’s enthusiasm is evident and tangible as he points out the long list of projects his graduates are involved in around the Corridor. He points with pride to many private and University of Iowa buildings in Johnson County, including improvements to Kinnick Stadium and the Coralville Marriott Hotel and other River Landing district elements.
“In Cedar Rapids, there is great work going on with the new main fire station on First Avenue. For that matter, it’s amazing all the infrastructure building going on with the new convention center, renovation of the new Doubletree hotel. There are new city and county buildings that rose after the Flood of 2008, of course. It’s a lot of work,” he said.
Then Luchtenburg gestures in a broad way around him, pointing out his teaching area in Jones Hall.
“This whole end of the building where we teach Masonry Construction is one of the best examples. Our students helped build all of this!” he says with pride.
These students have recently been making their marks and moving ahead in the Iowa masonry industry. One company that has hired several graduates is Moyle Masonry of Manchester, Iowa. Owner Steve Moyle says hiring grads from the program “saves a lot of time” and makes further training progress much easier for his company.
“I’ve been pretty impressed with what Joe teaches these students. They come to us with solid, basic knowledge,” Moyle said. “Most people who just walk onto a job site and want to learn the trade don’t make it. There are so many aspects of our trade that need that core set of skills already there. Joe does a nice job of getting that knowledge down and making his grads ready for what we need them to do. It’s a huge benefit to us.”
Industrial Technologies Dean Jeff Mitchell observes that Kirkwood’s program is the only Masonry program offered by a community college in the state. “This program is key to the success of masonry contractors throughout Iowa.
“The knowledge and skills our students learn align directly with employer needs. Students graduate with a strong work ethic ready to start the track from apprentice through journeyman to the Master Mason skill levels.” Mitchell added.
While Luchtenburg and other Kirkwood leaders are proud to point to local projects as close as the college campus, they acknowledge the periodic economic gyrations of economic conditions in the Midwest.
“Sure, over the past 20 years we’ve had up and down times. It was interesting that the big recession of five or six years ago also found this area rebuilding from the record flood damage. It’s been quite a time for the trades. But we’re proud to say we have placed grads with good firms in Wisconsin, Illinois, Kansas, Minnesota—pretty much all around the Midwest. That’s one of the powerful things about a certified mason with those credentials. You are able to show you can work and go to work anywhere in the United States,” Luchtenburg said.
To highlight that final point, Luchtenburg noted with pride that all of his 2013 Masonry graduates are now employed in the field in eastern Iowa.
Kirkwood’s Masonry Construction program is a nine-month diploma, spanning two semesters, that prepares students to enter the trade of bricklaying. Students are given a hands-on intensive introduction to the skills used by bricklayers. Classroom experience takes place between an internship with an instructor of the program and the masonry field experience at the end of the program.