Lucas Hamilton, Manager, Building Science Applications for CertainTeed Corporation, was part of a team from the Saint-Gobain family of companies that visited with YouthBuild Akron to provide an educational session on building green. Lucas has since wrote an inspiring blog post about his experience which can found here on CertainTeed’s Building Knowledge blog.
Check out this video update of the progress of the YouthBuild Philadelphia green rehab project on Greene Street, where the Saint-Gobain, CertainTeed and YouthBuild partnership is working to transform a home that had been vacant for 20 years into a model for sustainable, affordable housing.
As you’ll see in the video update, after many months of demolition on the interior of the home, the YouthBuild Philly team completed the installation of donated CertainTeed Cool Star roofing material that will increase the energy efficiency of the home.
More updates to come! Go, YouthBuild Philly, go!!!
December 8th, 2011 was a cold, blustery day but the Worcester YouthBuild students still had smiles on their faces as they entered the conference room at the SGC Abrasives Manufacturing Plant in Worcester. A greeting and safety orientation was the first order of business followed by an inspirational speech by Tom Oliver, Plant Manager. He told his story of how hard work and dedication that began when he was just an entry-level mixer, overtime earned him the opportunity to become a manager. Students reveled in the possibilities for themselves. Tours of both the bonded abrasives and superabrasives manufacturing areas kept the students enthralled. The session ended with a brief question and answer session and the students receiving SGC t-shirts and farewell handshakes.
Worcester YouthBuild then traveled over to the SGC Research & Development Plant in Northboro where the atmosphere was much different. Another greeting and safety orientation started the tour, which would encompass several labs and specialized machinery. Students were amazed to see how materials could be viewed at microscopic levels, even more so to discover that it wasn’t the making of the products that was the main focus but their “breaking points” under extreme conditions that took center stage. Students learned that R&D was about improving products and SGC was continually working on ways to do just that.
Career Day concluded with SGC providing a gourmet pizza lunch for Worcester YouthBuild and Lynne Lirette, Human Resources Director, offering students information on career paths at SGC. She took the time to outline some of the educational, vocational and skill requirements for different positions at the plants, closing the session with encouragement for students to apply.
Overall, Worcester YouthBuild thoroughly enjoyed their SGC Career Day and welcomed the possibility of someday being employed by such a great company. Here are just a few things that the students had to say…
“I enjoyed learning about the different grains used to make the different (grinding) gears and the microscopic analysis of materials at Research and Development.” – T. Taylor
“(I liked) the job opportunity and the ladder to work your way up to a better position. I love the fact that you could get paid to blow stuff up.” – R. Marines
“I liked it all and they were very nice people answering any question I had.” – C. Farrar
“I enjoyed learning about (grinding) wheels, fibers and chemistry.” – E. Allen
“The tour was amazing!” – K. Kozlowski
Hello! We want to bring you up to speed on the progress on our GreenBuild project at YouthBuild Philly. Our major accomplishment in the past two weeks was putting up the 2nd and 3rd floor. We like putting in the floors because we get to do a lot of hammering. Here is what the 2nd floor looks like now:
The roof is being installed today. We are insulating the top and the bottom of the roof to keep the home energy efficient. The materials were donated by Saint-Gobain through its leading subsidiary CertainTeed. Thank you for your help! Here’s what the house looks like from the outside today, and if you look closely, you can see the person on the roof:
We just cut wood for our window frames, and we will be installing the frames today. After we finish installing the windows, we will begin framing the interior of the home. Here are more photos of us working on the home today:
Desiree Measures Wood for Framing the Windows
Malik Prepares to Drill the Window Frames
The students in the Green Building vocational training at YouthBuild Philadelphia Charter School would like to share all the things that we have learned in the last week. For the first six weeks of the school year, we were in the classrooms on “school side.” We are excited to be on the worksite now!
We learned how to measure and put nails into the floor. Then we learned how to use power tools like circular saws and miter saws. We are also learning about being green by recycling and using recycled materials.
Climbing up the ladders may have been a challenge to some of the students, but we learned how to push pass our fears and accomplish team goals. Sacrificing for your team is part of teamwork, and the Green Building squad gets the job done!
Here are some photos of us on the worksite:
YouthBuild Philly’s new Green Building team is traveling to Toronto, Canada for the U.S. Green Building Council’s International GreenBuild Conference! Most of us have never been traveled outside of Philadelphia, so we are really excited about this opportunity.
“I’ve never been out of Philly, so this will be a great experience for me,” said team member Mary Ford, age 20. “I can’t wait to see a new place and meet new people to share our knowledge with.”
We are all looking forward to meeting other YouthBuild students from across the country and sharing our experiences. All the members of the Green Building team are new students at YouthBuild. We were accepted into the program at the beginning of September, and we have learned a lot in our first month on the worksite.
We are excited to learn about new green technology at the conference that we can bring back to our GreenBuild project in Philadelphia. Right now, we are still in the early phases of rebuilding the house, but we plan to use a lot of building techniques and materials to make the home green.
Watch a short video from a member of our team:
Desiree, YouthBuild Philly student, talks about our upcoming trip!
Stay tuned to hear all about our trip and the conference when we return from Toronto!
