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Welcome to the FourMan Podcast, where four shop teachers step out of the classroom and into the booth to talk all things building, trades, and the people behind the tools. Each week, we welcome a surprise guest from the world of construction — from seasoned pros to rising stars — to share real stories, career insights, and the kind of shop talk you won’t hear anywhere else.
Whether you're a student just picking up your first hammer or a veteran foreman with sawdust in your veins, this podcast brings you humor, heart, and a heavy dose of hands-on wisdom. Just straight-up conversations built on blue-collar pride.
Join us as we build futures, one episode at a time.
Jake Carter (00:00)
Teaching and passing the knowledge along. And I think that's a great thing again, to come back to what you all are doing and so much of what's happening in the industry in this Instagram, YouTube podcast era is that people are willing to share. And it's like, we all build walls. We might do it a little bit differently, but
Scott Hughes (00:07)
. .
Jake Carter (00:18)
there's no like patented proprietary secret, right? And so like we can share information and tips and tricks on how to frame that wall faster or how to
figure out tile layout faster, whatever it may be. And so yeah, we absolutely have to be constantly learning ourselves and then willing to pass that on.
Noah (00:47)
We are here with none other than Jake Carter, who is out of Kitsap County. Habitat, I've known Jake for, I don't know, probably five years, maybe, we connected, and we met in person at IBS.
Ken Shek (00:55)
. .
Jake Carter (01:00)
Something like that, yeah, four or five years ago.
Noah (01:04)
And it was on the rail that we were talking that I realized, man, you have some serious chops. You basically are extremely dedicated to trades education. ⁓ You're extremely accomplished in what you've done for Habitat. I think you built a net zero house. Is that correct?
Jake Carter (01:22)
Yeah, we built two last
year.
Noah (01:24)
That's impressive done some impressive things
so who better than to talk about you know never stop learning something that comes up from everybody we talked to is basically if you're focused on educating yourself being teachable you can go very far your proof of that Jake welcome to the podcast we really appreciate you being on here.
Jake Carter (01:45)
Thanks, Noah. Thanks for the invite. Appreciate it. Happy to talk to you guys.
Ken Shek (01:47)
Okay.
Noah (01:48)
Yeah. Yeah, we appreciate it. So we'll kick right off. So
Jake, when you hear the phrase never stop learning, what does that mean to you?
Jake Carter (01:57)
I think it's, you know, every day working in the trades. You have to
Ken Shek (02:01)
you
Jake Carter (02:03)
be willing and eager to learn, regardless of what type of trade you're in. If you're specializing in something or you're a generalist, materials are always changing, codes are always changing, processes are always changing, who you're working with is changing. And so you've got to want to learn every single day.
Ken Shek (02:17)
Okay.
Jake Carter (02:23)
If you do that, I think you can advance your career and that's a great thing about the trades, especially the residential side of construction. You can choose your own path. There's not a linear progression like the commercial trades and unions, which are great opportunities
as well, but they have defined structures. You're gonna do this for this long and then you'll graduate to this role or job title, whereas residential, if you're hungry and you wanna learn, can go far.
Ken Shek (02:42)
.
Noah (02:52)
Yeah, that's awesome. as far as in your I remember us talking to you actually went to Virginia Tech. that correct? So is your is your education background in construction?
Jake Carter (02:59)
I did. Yep. Go Hokies.
Uh, no, it's not, you know, um, just like most of you all, um, millennial, you know, I was, grew up in, in Southwest Virginia, outside of Bristol. That's how I ended up being a Hokie. And, you know, most of us in high school were told, well, if you want to be successful, you want to get out of here, out of this small town, you got to go to college. Uh, so no, my degree is actually in biology and wildlife science. So I thought I was going to be a, you know, a researcher or a game warden or something. Um, so that's what I went to school for. And, um,
Scott Hughes (03:05)
Okay.
Ken Shek (03:05)
. .
Scott Hughes (03:20)
Okay. Okay.
Jake Carter (03:35)
grew up, you know, working on things. We had a family farm and was always
learning and tinkering with my grandfather. My grandparents raised me and that was just kind of natural to learn how to do things. And we relocated to Washington State in 2015 and yeah, I worked for some developers and some property management companies and then really decided to lean into construction heavily when we moved out here.
Ken Shek (03:42)
.
Noah (04:01)
as when you start out, what are things that you think that young people really should be focusing on? looking back at your career, what are the things that early on really stood out for you? And almost like a take of, OK, so we have a lot of young people. You work with young people. What should they really be focusing on? And what did you focus on that really got you to where you are today?
Jake Carter (04:23)
Yeah, I mean, first I had a couple of really great mentors, a couple really good people I worked for early on when I was working out in the field. And, you know, I think a couple of big things, one is just pay attention. When you're on a job site, you need to do that just to be safe, number one, right? But pay attention, pay attention to your surroundings, pay attention to your boss, your colleagues, what's going on. You know, never, never be standing still, right? Like there's always something to do. And so,
Ken Shek (04:46)
Okay. you
Scott Hughes (04:53)
.
Jake Carter (04:54)
I had a really good first boss. It was a small, you know, four person crew. And it was like, there's always something to do, you know, pay attention, pick this up, be thinking about what the next guy needs, hand them materials, feed them things. And so that was instilled in me early on. And so I just
Scott Hughes (05:03)
Okay.
Jake Carter (05:13)
always tried to be prepared for what was next and ask those questions to keep the project flowing. So
Ken Shek (05:16)
.
Jake Carter (05:21)
I think that's one thing is
Ken Shek (05:22)
.
Jake Carter (05:22)
just be aware, pay attention.
and
then start to think, right? And then as you learn, you gotta ask questions. Some people don't want the quote unquote stupid question, but in construction, I don't know if there really is one because you gotta learn some way. And so if you're new on site doing something, you gotta ask the question if you don't know how. Because the last thing you wanna do is go and do something incorrectly, right? Because that's not good for anybody. So yeah, then ask those questions and
Scott Hughes (05:34)
Okay.
Jake Carter (05:53)
and keep progressing.
Ken Shek (05:57)
What do you think is the best way to prepare these like so in our class we have a full spectrum of kids Like some want to go into the trade some don't really care about the trades or just trying to take the class to get out of
doing actual schoolwork. But with the kids that we do see a future for in the trades, what would be one or two things that we could do as instructors to help prepare them to get to that job site and be someone that the guy that's hiring would be interested in hiring them?
Jake Carter (06:37)
Yeah, good question. mean, all of you are doing great things. think I've met most of you, I follow you all online. So your programs are doing great. So I think you got the basics. I think what I'm looking for and when I'm
looking to hire somebody or some of the workforce development stuff that I'm involved with is, can they think critically and be agile, think on their feet kind of thing, right? Like construction's tough and whether you're working, I'm at a Habitat for Humanity, so it's a nonprofit, so it's a little bit different, but I've got plenty of for-profit experience. So regardless of what type of company you're doing, big, small, custom, spec, like if you're in residence,
construction, the best plans can go to crap in a second, right? For nobody's fault, Inspections, weather, delivery delays, and so you've always got to be, you know, thinking quick and problem-solving. And so I think you kind of want to challenge those students, the ones that you think are going to go into the trades, you give them the harder projects, you give
Scott Hughes (07:26)
Okay. you
Jake Carter (07:43)
them, you know, the assignment to lead a group, right? I tell every kid that I talk to,
Scott Hughes (07:46)
you
Jake Carter (07:49)
going into the trades is if you don't like working in a team then the trades probably isn't for you because even if you're a an amazing Finnish carpenter that is a one-person operation you're still relying on the people before
Scott Hughes (07:50)
you
Ken Shek (07:54)
.
Jake Carter (08:02)
you and you're relying on the people after you so it's a it's it is a team effort regardless of what type of work you're doing and what size company goes for so I would think you you challenge them a little bit more than the other students and kind of practice that problem solving and that you
Scott Hughes (08:07)
.
Jake Carter (08:19)
critical thinking ⁓ and then you get them into you leading projects and getting them to understand that it's always a team effort to get stuff done. I've seen with our local skill
center there's some of the excelling kids it's like ⁓ we just want to work by ourselves we know what we're doing right we've passed the rest of the class.
Scott Hughes (08:33)
you you
Jake Carter (08:39)
And the local skill center that I do a lot with, they're framing up walls for a project for us right now. And the teacher was very specific. He's like, we're going to, it was a ready frame package from BFS. So super simple, right? They've got all the instructions and everything's labeled. And he's like, he intentionally broke
up the teams into the kids that were just there because they don't like school and they can go there for two and a half hours a day with the kids that usually don't want to work with anybody. It's like, you have to do this together, right?
Scott Hughes (09:01)
.
Jake Carter (09:09)
a one-person project. So I think those are two things that you can kind of set them up for success for. The other thing is, I guess, is just from a soft skills perspective. I'm sure you all are seeing it in your classrooms. A lot of the younger kids struggle with soft skills for some reason. And so maybe old school, because I was raised by my grandparents, and I don't think it has to be like, yes sir, no sir, yes ma'am, no ma'am. But educating them on how to
speak
to their peers, how to speak to someone in charge, because again in construction depending on who you're working for you're going to be potentially interacting with clients or at least seeing them right if you're remodeling homes that kind of stuff so you need to be able to speak to people respectfully ⁓ and understand when to keep your mouth shut sometimes right.
Ken Shek (09:59)
Thank you.
Adam Kennard (09:59)
How do you, that's great.
Yeah, that's really good. I like that a lot and I'm gonna still remember that. How do you, but you made some comments about like mistakes and then the idea of like kind of getting back on the wagon, ⁓ especially in your ⁓ work first development world. like basically where you're, I mean, you have very not said this, but you're basically a shop teacher part-time. I've gathered, I mean. ⁓
Scott Hughes (10:26)
.
Jake Carter (10:28)
Somewhere, yeah.
Adam Kennard (10:29)
I little bit of a faul- I don't know exactly how it all shakes out, but you... But either way, but just like, that is one thing that I wrestle with, is because they can't...
you know, shoot 10 out of 10 free throws the moment they get in the shop with the drill or
that they'll just be like, oh, I've never done this or I just can't do this and just like write it off. And I tried to just, and then I tried to remind them, it's like, how many times have you ever done this? And they're like, well, I helped my grandpa hang a picture like four years ago. And I'm like, cool. Have you touched a tool since then? They're like, no. So I'm like, okay, let's like try it again.
Scott Hughes (10:54)
. .
Ken Shek (11:08)
Thank
Adam Kennard (11:12)
So just like how have you seen to like encourage students to ⁓ like
to keep trying because like that I feel like that's also a big piece of ⁓ the teachable piece is like be willing to like own up to a mistake that you made like it happens. ⁓ I've shown my students my mistakes all the time trying to encourage them that I still make them. ⁓
and but then like, you know, be teachable through that moment.
Jake Carter (11:46)
Yeah, no, I think what you just said is that is how I approach it too. It's like it's, you know, construction is a complex thing ⁓ and we should all be learning. just we're all on a different scale of where we are in our learning journey, right? And the best carpenters that I know still make mistakes, but they're really good at fixing their mistakes before most people ever even see it. Right. And so we're all on this.
Scott Hughes (11:48)
you you
.
Jake Carter (12:16)
journey to be craftsman
or crafts people right in the trades and again if you're a specialist or generalist whatever you want to work on and so it's it's being willing to make those mistakes acknowledging those mistakes that's what I did teach the summer school program at the skill center last year and that's one thing as I noticed is like you know they would be working on a basic assignment of screwing together some boards and do a specific you know shape with dimensions and somebody makes mistakes
and they like try to hide it, you know? It's like just acknowledge the mistake. None of us are perfect. And how do we prevent the mistake from happening again? And for me, you know, especially with Habitat and we're having volunteers all the time, I'm not on site every day. I'm in this office a lot of the time. I wish I was out on site more, but it's like safety's got to be a huge priority, right? And so you definitely don't want mistakes that lead to safety issues. But mistakes happen. And so how do you support them? And so what we're focused
Ken Shek (12:48)
It's simply not.
Scott Hughes (12:49)
Okay. Okay.
Ken Shek (13:07)
Right. Thank
Scott Hughes (13:10)
. .
Jake Carter (13:15)
focused
on it at Habitat. We do some work-based learning with another school and obviously we got volunteers and most of the volunteers don't are super familiar with what they're coming out to help us do and so it's like we want to we want to educate people and then we want to empower them you know instill that confidence in them to to try to use a nail gun for the first time in their life and then say yep that's how it works and then do it again and then do it again and then you know the sixth or seventh nail the gun jam
or you know it doesn't set all the way because the compressor didn't, right? And it's like, yep, that's part of it, right? And then you just kind of get that workflow. So I think you're already on to most of what I would say.
Ken Shek (13:50)
So.
Scott Hughes (14:02)
Well, something I like that you've mentioned is the learning.
part of it, be always learning. ⁓ I think of, cause you're like, when you're new on the crew, you want to look around and see just what needs to be done and keep feeding boards and all that. I think of that's a lot of times we think of, yeah, he's, you know, they're green, they need to learn, they're, developing. And we kind of, I don't know, I think in general as an industry, we kind of say that's kind of when learning stops, you know, they kind of, okay, they can build a wall now, but
Ken Shek (14:06)
.
Scott Hughes (14:34)
man, like you said, the very experienced person, they get to the point where they can catch an error like way on down, you know, way before things happen. And I just think of how, I mean, I used to not even own a crew or like I was kind of in charge of a framing crew with someone else. And then I got this job and like, I have learned so much. and so I like,
Ken Shek (14:37)
Yeah. ⁓
Scott Hughes (15:03)
Like you say, the learning never stops. And if we can, and I try to stress professionalism with the kids and that like, you know, you don't want to be carrying boards around when you're my age. You know, you want to be carrying a clipboard, you know, you know, it's fun. It's fun to do the work, but like not because you have to, like, you know, you want to be in, you know, writing estimates or, know, you want to be in charge of the people you want to, you want to get to the point, you know, when you're 70 years old, you can retire. You've made enough money.
Ken Shek (15:22)
Okay.
Scott Hughes (15:32)
And, uh, so I don't know, I try to stress that personal journey, the growth of knowledge and like, yeah, it's cool to build stuff, kind of as you grow, you're going to develop people that can build stuff and you're going to develop a team and you're going to, you're going to develop your own skills. You're going to, your tools are going to change, but you're, you're hopefully still going to be, you know, grinding some sweet projects out. So.
Ken Shek (15:46)
Okay.
Jake Carter (15:52)
Yeah, absolutely.
Adam Kennard (15:59)
But one thing I think that I randomly point because that's where you are on my screen. ⁓
Jake Carter (15:59)
Yeah.
Adam Kennard (16:05)
But you can edit that part out. ⁓ Sorry, Noah.
Noah (16:09)
We're leaving it in. We do it live.
Scott Hughes (16:09)
No edits. There's no edits in this thing.
Adam Kennard (16:13)
but is, ⁓
Ken Shek (16:14)
You ⁓
Adam Kennard (16:16)
one thing I think is important to talk about for a brief moment and all of us get it because we're in the aspect of education somewhere, but is also willingness to be a teacher. Like Jake, you mentioned something real off the cuff, ⁓ about like your foreman, one of your first crews that you were on. And it just, made a small remark that it sounded like they were willing to teach and like not have the dumb question and you know,
You know sure we can all you know poke at the greenhorn and make him go get the locks They're the board stretcher when he cuts something too short like one time ⁓ but ⁓ I don't know. I think there's just an important thing to like have If you want new people which you know all of the stats say we need on blah blah blah all of that kind of stuff
I also don't want to send an 18 year old that is decent to some on a crew. know, like, you know, I'll just be, you know, yeah, well, I, use some language there. That's for Noah, even though I have the kids.
Scott Hughes (17:25)
.
Adam Kennard (17:26)
but, ⁓ I just think about that. ⁓ occasionally.
Noah (17:27)
I've never heard you cuss before, honestly.
Jake Carter (17:30)
We're
breaking barriers here.
Noah (17:33)
haha
Adam Kennard (17:33)
Yeah.
Scott Hughes (17:35)
Ken isn't saying anything because he's ⁓ looking for the Milwaukee board stretcher.
Ken Shek (17:38)
Thank
Noah (17:40)
Yeah
Jake Carter (17:40)
Yeah.
Ken Shek (17:43)
have two of them. What are you talking about?
Scott Hughes (17:45)
You
Adam Kennard (17:46)
That comes in the...
Jake Carter (17:46)
No, that's you're exactly
right, Adam. And I think, I mean, that's what you all are doing on this podcast. And that's what's exciting to see as an industry. And really that's what motivated me ⁓ to get so involved in workforce development locally and in a variety of ways is, you know, I was, I transitioned from working in the field full time to a kind of a superintendent role where you're on in the field, but you're not really, you know, bags on you go and,
Fix the the last minute things before an inspection, but you know wasn't really working so started that leadership journey back in 2017 and then moved up into project management and So here I am working for a decent-sized local GC like construction like commercial residential a lot of multifamily stuff and so I'm always the youngest one in the room and I'm starting to work on contracts and all of our subs Great trade partners. They wanted to they would sign the contract
for the work, but then three months later when I needed the electricians, know, there are two crews of three to be on a multifamily job. It's like, well, I only got one crew, you know, and it was just constant. And I heard it from every trade partner that we worked with, from the highly skilled licensed, you know, MEP guys all the way down through like our construction cleaners, because you know, a multifamily job, she got these huge cleaning crews. I'm like, man, what's going on? And then you go out on site and you got these
Scott Hughes (18:58)
. .
Jake Carter (19:16)
Classic.
construction, old salty guys just
ripping people a new one left and right. And there's this young kid, you know, shaking in his boots because he doesn't know what to do. And it's like, well, yeah, maybe they're not going to make it in construction because that's not the welcoming environment. so, yeah, I was super unfortunate to have, you know, and it was, he was a business owner, right? And so he knew that he needed good employees and I worked for him for a short time and we're, you know, I still call.
Scott Hughes (19:27)
Okay.
Ken Shek (19:35)
100%.
Scott Hughes (19:38)
Push.
Jake Carter (19:48)
him for problem solving. He's a great local builder. And ⁓ yeah, we absolutely have to have that culture of ⁓ learning and educating, right? Teaching and passing the knowledge along. And I think that's a great thing again, to come back to what you all are doing and so much of what's happening in the industry in this Instagram, YouTube podcast era is that people are willing to share. And it's like, we all ⁓ build walls. We might do it a little bit differently, but
Scott Hughes (20:05)
. .
Jake Carter (20:18)
there's no like patented proprietary secret, right? And so like we can share information and tips and tricks on how to frame that wall faster or how to
figure out tile layout faster, whatever it may be. ⁓ And so yeah, we absolutely have to be constantly learning ourselves and then willing to pass that on. And if everyone starts to do that just a little bit more, then I think we'll continue to see the positive trends of young people wanting to enter the trades and wanting to learn and not be afraid to ask
questions and you know one thing back to what Scott was saying is you we need everybody in the trades we need laborers that you know that just want to do the grunt work we need you know fine crafts people that want to do very detailed type work and everything in between so you can you can find your niche
Ken Shek (21:07)
When I think
Noah (21:07)
Do you think?
Ken Shek (21:08)
one of the biggest challenges, sorry Noah, I'll take this.
One of the biggest challenges, like we talked about it at JLC live with a lot of the like influencers is this isn't, we got to get away from that stigmatism of like we're competing against everyone. This isn't about competition. Like if we can all collaborate, like we can increase the knowledge base in a much faster speed than just someone trying to start a business. Don't I have any idea what to do?
Scott Hughes (21:30)
Okay. Okay.
Ken Shek (21:43)
and then just go through and figure it out by making all of the same mistakes 30 other people have made. They just haven't had a conversation.
Jake Carter (21:52)
Yeah.
Scott Hughes (21:54)
Okay.
Noah (21:54)
Do you think that like the Instagram community, it was just the reason I know you Jake, which is incredible and everything like that. There's such an emphasis on high performance. You've obviously built a net zero home. This is switching gears a little bit. But do you think like, how do you think that should be taught in high school? Do you think that that should be avoided the whole high performance building or do you think that that's
something that should be basically looked at? Because that's something that I always struggle with. I'm like, I wonder if I'm doing it wrong. I wonder if I'm doing it right.
And I know each individual student you can look at differently and you have to look at them and then give the ones the knowledge at certain times. But like where would you say your focus you see a lot of young people you have a ton of knowledge especially if you're building what you're building with habitat like where should that be introduced.
Ken Shek (22:24)
Okay. Okay.
Jake Carter (22:42)
Yeah, well, that's a tough question.
Scott Hughes (22:42)
.
Jake Carter (22:44)
we're
Scott Hughes (22:44)
you
Jake Carter (22:44)
fortunate. Hot take. ⁓ I mean, you know, I'm fortunate where we're at. Our Habitat affiliate had a foundation of ⁓ what we want to say is just building it right, not.
Noah (22:45)
This one's for the grams. I'm gonna get
you to say something to offend somebody.
Jake Carter (23:06)
not high performance, right? So there was a foundation there. We were already putting solar panels on homes. We were already getting close to Energy Star and that had been a thing in the works for a while. So we were able to just make some tweaks.
Scott Hughes (23:07)
.
Jake Carter (23:25)
At a broader discussion in terms of education, all the amazing work you
guys are doing, I think that we've got to first teach the basics, right? And my perspective, I've probably said it three times already since we've been talking, is we need so many people and so many careers, right?
laborers, delivery drivers, operators, carpenters, electrician, everything, right? And ⁓ I would be worried if high performance was like the only thing that was taught because it's super important.
But really high performance is just building it right. And then there's this like big scale of like, you're just building a really good house that's code. And then certain parts of the country code is really good. Other areas, maybe not so much. And then you can go to a certified home of some sort to all the way to like passive house, right? Which is like the holy grail of durability and high performance. ⁓ you know, there's probably kids in your classes that don't want to be carpenters, right? Maybe they want to
Scott Hughes (24:07)
Okay.
Okay.
Jake Carter (24:33)
drywall or install tile or do you know something you know in a specialty trade right and so it's tough for all of you all I can't imagine looking at your curriculums and whatever requirements you may have for from your states but
like how do you how do you map that out to like touch on those points but not detract from just learning the basics of construction introducing and reinforcing those core soft skills to make them you know
Scott Hughes (24:48)
.
Ken Shek (24:58)
and
Jake Carter (25:03)
a good applicant for an open position. ⁓
because regardless of where you are across the country, most kids coming out of programs aren't going to go directly
to working with a company that's doing this extreme level, high performance type stuff. that's kind of my hot take for you, I guess, is just more of the basics and also the soft skills and everything. then introduce it when you can. I think multiple of you guys are doing that when the opportunity
Scott Hughes (25:19)
. you
Jake Carter (25:38)
a partnership project and get some support to do that.
Noah (25:45)
Love it, solid advice.
Adam Kennard (25:47)
Yeah. I mean, that lights up with what a lot of the YouTuber like Rice Anger or ⁓ Travis Brungarder will talk about the build network. ⁓ But of just like, you know, just.
Scott Hughes (25:48)
. you
Adam Kennard (26:05)
Dotting basic I's and crossing basic T's, like
Jake Carter (26:08)
you
Adam Kennard (26:09)
just lining up sheathing, clean installs, ⁓ you know, just, yeah, I don't know, just the kind of more basic skill sets that are just like, let's get this right. ⁓ right, correct.
Jake Carter (26:24)
Yeah, regardless of what you're working on, let's do it right.
And that's I mean, that's.
Adam Kennard (26:29)
And a lot of that is just
like good craftsmanship turns into better performing houses because they're just built well. And then add the layers of, you know, all the inches of insulation and ERVs and blah, blah, blah. then, but a lot of that is still just like, again, just well executed basic set of skills on the,
Scott Hughes (26:35)
Okay.
⁓
Adam Kennard (26:59)
On the boots on the ground. Yes, there's engineering in the background that is happening. So that way we understand, but a lot of that is like just duct runs again, or yeah, I don't, mean, not to simplify everything, but, ⁓ yeah.
Scott Hughes (27:14)
Well, I think we can, I think we can. ⁓
Jake Carter (27:14)
Yeah, no, I absolutely agree.
Scott Hughes (27:18)
point kids in that direction and do some things. mean, we could do like a rain screen with some exterior insulation, like on one part of the house or something. You know, it doesn't have to be the whole thing. don't gotta, you know, completely go off, off the deep end. My dad would always say, cause my dad was a shop teacher. And when I very first started this job, we had this kind of cool house, had all these little details and stuff. He's like, what are you doing? Like you're kind of like you're.
Ken Shek (27:19)
So.
Scott Hughes (27:45)
You're you're making it hard on yourself if
Ken Shek (27:45)
.
Scott Hughes (27:46)
you can just teach them the basics they will go. They'll go out in industry and they'll find a job and they're going to learn all the little. Extra things and I was like, you know that's that's true. So Jake, I question though I I was listening to something where you were talking about with your program. Kind of your you're helping students get placed in jobs, right? And is there like a?
like $5 per hour subsidy that, know, kind of your program. I think that is real slick and you're, you, something that stuck out to me in your head was, cause we all know like they're going to have to slow down to, you know, bring someone up to speed. So, in the whole, don't have to be against each other. can all be sharing, kind of sharing our methods so we can all get better. So I think that's fantastic. Cause that's one thing we struggle with is,
You know, we want kids to enroll in our class, but we also want to get kids out in internships or, you know, and out in industry, but also the insurance issue can be a problem. Who's going to cover this kid, especially if they're not 18 yet. So, ⁓ there, there's a bunch of, there's some red tape there, but I felt like that, you know, helping offset that additional cost of a young, unexperienced person. That was pretty slick. I thought that was pretty neat.
Ken Shek (28:59)
Thank you.
Jake Carter (29:10)
Yeah,
that's our local...
Ken Shek (29:13)
.
Jake Carter (29:13)
Home
Builders Association, the Kitset Building Association. That's called our Builder Grant Program. And so that's actually been around for seven years. I've been involved the last like three and a half on the current chair last year and this year. So just carrying on what was already successful. yeah, so it's a six week program. They do have to be 18, 18 to 24 years old. And it's a placement. We interviewed the young people
Ken Shek (29:34)
from.
Noah (29:37)
Thanks
Scott Hughes (29:43)
.
Jake Carter (29:43)
and kind of vet them. And then we're working with all the members of the association that need young people. And so we got a roster of companies that are looking to hire just general laborers or maybe a specific trade. And then the kids apply and we ask them three trades that they're interested in. You know, it's kind of interesting the last two years it's been HVAC, which is great. There's a huge hole there, but it's tough to
Ken Shek (29:53)
.
Jake Carter (30:07)
place a lot of them. And so we match them up in the company and the young person commit to six weeks.
Scott Hughes (30:09)
So,
Jake Carter (30:13)
And so as long as they're showing up and not being a hazard on the job site, the company is going to keep them on. So very rarely do they have to let somebody go before the six weeks is up. But it's just ⁓ an internship of sorts, right? Where they get to be on a job
Scott Hughes (30:15)
thank you.
Jake Carter (30:30)
site and learn about a trade. Some young people come in and say, I want to be a plumber and I can make a bunch of money. it's like, well, you can, but you got to pay your dues first. So the six weeks, you're going to be digging trenches and then crawl spaces, running pipe, right?
Scott Hughes (30:30)
you
Ken Shek (30:38)
Okay. ⁓
Jake Carter (30:43)
Maybe you don't like that, right? And so it's just a good opportunity.
And so the company hires them directly so that all the insurance things are taken care of. The young person gets $500 from our foundation to get a pair of boots, rain jacket, tools, whatever. And then yeah, we do offset their wages. So at the end of the six weeks, the company submits a form to get that wage reimbursement. Because it is, when you're taking on somebody who's totally green, someone on your crew is losing a
Ken Shek (30:59)
.
Jake Carter (31:13)
little bit of time. Now you hope that investment returns, but it's just a way to help that. So yeah, it's a cool program. ⁓ Again, I didn't start it. I'm just happy to be carrying it on right now.
Scott Hughes (31:16)
Yep.
I think it's pretty cool.
Adam Kennard (31:27)
That's all fun.
Noah (31:28)
Yeah, I
love that. That's very cool. Well, Jake, we told you 30 minutes. We've taken a little bit extra of your time. But before we close it out, this is something that we've been asking people. We asked at JLC Live. A bus comes and takes us all out, all these shop teachers. You have to come into our classroom and teach the class for the day. What are you teaching the young people? How are you starting them off on their journey of basically learning?
Ken Shek (31:37)
Yes.
Jake Carter (31:54)
Hmm. It's a tricky one. ⁓ It just like pops up all over the country and maybe you'll have to switch
Noah (31:56)
It's a tricky bust, honestly, that hit us. Yeah.
Scott Hughes (32:00)
Thank you.
Adam Kennard (32:00)
Yeah, I but.
Ken Shek (32:03)
Thanks.
Jake Carter (32:04)
it to like you all got beamed up by by aliens. Yeah. There you go. Let's see. What am I teaching them?
Noah (32:08)
Yeah, you're right. We didn't have it planned for like the end thing. We'll cut that. actually, yeah, we'll steal that idea. I like that better.
Scott Hughes (32:13)
Mm.
Jake Carter (32:24)
Call me off guard.
Noah (32:26)
It's a goal.
Jake Carter (32:28)
Yeah. ⁓
Scott Hughes (32:30)
I mean there's safety that's real exciting that you gotta
Adam Kennard (32:33)
always.
Jake Carter (32:33)
yeah, they
love that. When I did the three week summer school, know, it was ⁓ eighth to tenth graders for three weeks and we spent the first four days on safety and on the fourth day they were ready to riot. But hey, they were using power tools by the end of it. So, ⁓ yeah. ⁓
Scott Hughes (32:46)
Mmm. Mmm. There you go.
Noah (32:49)
Hahaha
Scott Hughes (32:53)
I just say you gotta get them excited.
Jake Carter (33:00)
think I would probably just tools like tool introduction and an operation and use. Yeah, I'll go with that.
Noah (33:09)
Nice.
I love it. Well, Jake, this has been incredible.
Scott Hughes (33:15)
have we asked them, are you like a DeWalt Milwaukee? Are you?
Ken Shek (33:20)
That's not a thing,
you don't have to ask him that.
Noah (33:22)
We're getting all
the hot takes. We're shop teachers. We take whatever. Habitat's the same way. Habitat will take whatever they can get, just like us. That's why we connected so well.
Jake Carter (33:24)
all the hot takes. I... yeah.
Scott Hughes (33:24)
All right. He already said building science is a lie.
Jake Carter (33:33)
Yeah, so I mean, our tools, I started out as a DeWalt guy in the field back in the day because they had the best battery stuff. They were the early, and then I've transitioned to Milwaukee since. ⁓ So I started the...
Scott Hughes (33:34)
True, true.
Noah (33:50)
Between Adam Cussing and that, this has been a crazy episode.
Jake Carter (33:57)
Yeah, mostly Milwaukee these days, but you know, a good tool is a good tool. Definitely don't tell kids to worry about what the brand is. I've seen some incredible work done with Ryobi, if you know how to use it.
Scott Hughes (34:02)
Nice.
Right on.
Noah (34:12)
Yeah,
absolutely.
Ken Shek (34:14)
I think
that's fake news, but.
Scott Hughes (34:16)
I just feel a little weird to say that, but yeah.
Noah (34:19)
Also, to be, True Work is not sponsoring us. He's just a big fan.
Jake Carter (34:23)
⁓
Ken Shek (34:23)
What?
What?
Scott Hughes (34:25)
I don't know.
Jake Carter (34:25)
I remember from IBS two years ago when after the the the sash go dinner we were all hanging out and Ken was listing off his Every every catalog every every catalog of true works like complete wardrobe So you gotta you better get Jason to pony up something for you
Scott Hughes (34:36)
Wardrobe
Ken Shek (34:45)
Don't you worry, I'm working on that.
Noah (34:47)
Hahaha.
Ken Shek (34:49)
actively pursuing
it.
Jake Carter (34:51)
Like a special trades teacher shirt, you know? I think they could do something for you guys.
Noah (34:56)
Heck yeah.
Scott Hughes (34:57)
I like it.
Noah (34:57)
Four-man podcast shirt. Every guest gets one.
Ken Shek (34:58)
That is not
a bad idea. Yeah.
Jake Carter (34:59)
There you go.
Even better, even better.
Ken Shek (35:03)
Boom.
Noah (35:03)
can't on it,
Scott Hughes (35:03)
Maybe a new
Noah (35:04)
man.
Scott Hughes (35:04)
prep.
Ken Shek (35:05)
I can make that happen. Look at those EDOs. Nice.
Scott Hughes (35:08)
Woo!
Jake Carter (35:09)
I've got my t2s on. I do love the pants, man. They're... So, yeah. No, no, I'm just saying the pants are great. As a tall person, know, getting in, I got tired of ripping pants all the time, getting in and out of the truck, so...
Noah (35:12)
Hey I'm rocking these too. Last name? Hughes? Sorry Jake, what's up?
Scott Hughes (35:13)
Yeah. All right.
Ken Shek (35:14)
See? Look!
Scott Hughes (35:21)
Yeah.
Ken Shek (35:30)
real thing.
Scott Hughes (35:30)
tall are
you?
Jake Carter (35:31)
65.
Scott Hughes (35:33)
Ho, baby.
Noah (35:34)
Yeah, I didn't know that either and it kind of threw me off when we first met face to face. I think it was in the Flamingo Hotel.
Scott Hughes (35:41)
It
wasn't. It wasn't face to face. I'll tell you that.
Jake Carter (35:42)
Yeah. ⁓
Noah (35:44)
It wasn't face to face! Hey
yo! He's here all week guys! ⁓
Jake Carter (35:51)
Yeah We got it right there Scott was late, that's why we were missing it in the beginning
Noah (35:52)
Man, killing it. Alright, where was the humor this whole episode?
Ken Shek (35:59)
So serious.
Scott Hughes (36:00)
Yeah. Yes, sir. I got to be
polite.
Noah (36:05)
Yeah, he also can't afford a full camera.
Jake Carter (36:09)
Easy now.
Adam Kennard (36:10)
you
Scott Hughes (36:11)
All
right, all right.
Noah (36:13)
Well, I can't afford a camera at all.
Yup, that's it. Nailed it.
Scott Hughes (36:24)
⁓ jerks.
Jake Carter (36:25)
Ugh.
Noah (36:26)
All right, Jake, thanks for your time, man. I really appreciate it.
Ken Shek (36:28)
Thanks for your time, Jay.
Jake Carter (36:29)
Yeah, absolutely.
Adam Kennard (36:30)
Yeah,
thank you so much.
Jake Carter (36:30)
⁓ You guys are doing great stuff. It's cool to see the continuation of this community. give you guys kudos and...
Scott Hughes (36:39)
Likewise, dude.
Noah (36:40)
Yeah, it's awesome following you,
Jake Carter (36:44)
But you know, for you all as teachers to be busy and to take time to do this and get the messaging out in a different way, right? Because there's tons of podcasts out there and there's some good ones and some not so good ones, but I think you guys are authentic and so keep up the good work.
Scott Hughes (36:57)
We won't say what this one is.
Noah (37:01)
Thanks man, we really appreciate that. Awesome. Alright, see ya.
Adam Kennard (37:02)
Thank you, sir.
Jake Carter (37:03)
Yeah, absolutely. Alright, see you guys around.
Scott Hughes (37:06)
See ya.
Ken Shek (37:07)
Thanks,
Sherry.
Adam Kennard (37:07)
Bye.
Jake Carter (37:07)
Take care.