The scene Thursday afternoon wasn’t all that different from a signing day typically seen for high school athletes going into college, though those signings typically don’t take place in an unfinished house at the end of a cul-de-sac.

The Grundy Area Vocational Center, Carpenters Local 174, Narvick Bros. Construction, Vissering Construction, and D Construction gathered with four freshly-graduated high school students and their families at the trades program house at the end of Indian Grass Road to celebrate those four students earning apprenticeships to work construction as members of Carpenters Local 174.

Aaron Maxwell and Blake Ness will both be starting their careers with D Construction, while Owen Noon works with Narvick Bros., and Sean Lewis works for Vissering Construction. All four will begin their education through Carpenters Local 174, and upon completion, they will be considered journeyman carpenters.

This is the first year of the partnership.

“We’re fortunate that it worked out this year,” said Mike Gerrish, a business representative and organizer for the Mid-America Carpenters Regional Council Local 174. “Work looks to be plentiful, and we’re looking to build out our apprenticeships.”

GAVC instructor Keith Wills said the students go through a two-year program starting out as juniors. A lot of these students have never picked up a tool in their life, and the classes go from 50-60 kids down to 20 for the advanced class.

Wills said it gets competitive, but it gives students a chance to learn from the ground up.

The home the signing day was held in, Wills said, was a foundation at the beginning of the year. By Thursday, the frame was up entirely, and the front of the home had brickwork done on the front. As summer nears, construction on the home gets shut down for the summer. It’ll be up to next year’s students to finish it out.

Wills said the program has had a relationship with Gerrish for a long time, but nothing ever came to fruition as far as cementing a partnership between the GAVC and the union. This year, it worked out that D Construction, Narvick Bros., and Vissering Construction were willing to sponsor the students.

Wills said the students get to skip the seven-and-a-half-week program.

“It’s not every day you can come out of high school and have that,” Gerrish said. “I was fortunate enough to come out of high school right into the carpenters union, too.”

For Gerrish, his first foreman ever was actually Noon’s father. Now Noon is starting his career in the same field.

“It’s going to be a great career for these kids,” Wills said. “They all deserve. These kids are hardworking. We couldn’t get all 20 of them because they wanted to go different avenues, but these guys stuck it out.”

Wills said the hope is to truck along with the program and improve it to include electricians, laborers, plumbers, and other trades.

“Not all kinds want to be carpenters,” Wills said. “Some want to be electricians or operators or plumbers. We cover a wide spectrum of things related to building a house.”

Noon said the class gave the students a good base, showing them how to use any tool they’ll need for the future and providing insight on what their career will be like.

Lewis said the classes were full of honest feedback.

“Our teachers gave us honesty,” Lewis said. “They don’t hold back. If you do something stupid, you’ll learn about it and why it’s stupid, but they’re always helpful.”

For Maxwell, joining the class started as a whim. He knew he liked working with his hands, but carpentry wasn’t his initial long-term plan.

Ness, though, said he knew he wanted to do this kind of work since he was in around fifth grade.

“My dad was a floor installer, and he used to do roofs,” Ness said. “I’ve always wanted to be on a job site doing stuff like this.”