More than 60,000 students have had the opportunity to explore the building, design and construction industry and consider it as a career choice because of the ACE Mentor Program.
Remember the war for talent that all but disappeared when the economy crashed a few years ago? Guess what — it’s back, and it is only going to intensify. As the U.S. slowly works its way out of the recession, baby boomers who may have put off retirement will once again start planning to leave the workforce, and there will not be enough Gen Xers to fill the vacancies. This gives members of the Y Generation an opportunity to kick-start their careers. But another issue looms large — how do we attract them to the construction industry, which has often has been fraught with having a poor image?
One of the best ways is through the ACE (architecture, construction, engineering) Mentor Program, which has been around for almost two decades and is stronger than ever. After several years of experimenting with various mentoring models, ACE formed in 1994 when 17 firms banded together into three teams, each organized like a typical design and construction team, and “adopted” about 90 students from local high schools. Volunteers from each of the firms, serving as mentors, worked directly with the students to introduce them to the broad range of people and projects within the construction industry. To date, more than 50,000 students have participated in the ACE program, and that number continues to grow.
A BLUEPRINT FOR SUCCESS
ACE consists of affiliates that serve students within a certain city. Each affiliate has a board of directors, executive director and a number of professions from local design, construction and engineering firms. The companies form teams that are organized similar to project teams, and usually consist of an owner firm, a design firm an engineering firm and a construction manager or general contractor, as well as participants from a local college or university with programs in architecture, engineering or construction management. Each team mentors approximately 20 to 30 students for most of the school year.
ACE recruits students from public and private high schools, with special efforts made to reach women and minorities who may not realize the opportunities and rewards of a career in the design and construction industries. The goal is to introduce students to career possibilities as well as to teach communications skills, meeting deadlines, working as team members, etc.— skills that are necessary in business today.
Students are introduced to the various design professions and the role that each performs in planning, designing and constructing a project. Students also gain firsthand insight into the design industry by touring project offices and visiting active construction sites. Students form into teams that meet at least 15 times during the school year. Each team selects a project and goes through the entire design process, with help from the mentoring firms. The school year ends with a formal event where the teams present their projects.
In the spring of 1995, ACE New York held its first fundraising event to establish a scholarship program for ACE graduates. Scholarships continue to be awarded on an annual basis to ACE graduates who go on to college to study for a career in the design and construction industry. To date, ACE has awarded more than $12 million in scholarships to promising students.
DOES ACE WORK? SURVEY SAYS … YES!
ACE conducted benchmark research in 2010 to quantify ACE’s impact to date on its mission to “engage, excite and enlighten high school students to pursue careers in architecture, construction and engineering.” ACE students who completed the program between 2002 and 2009 were invited to participate in the survey, which garnered 933 (26%) responses out of 3,666 surveys sent.
One of the findings of the survey shows that ACE participants 
graduate high school at a higher rate (97%) than their non-ACE counterparts (73%), as shown in Exhibit 1.
In addition, 94% of ACE participants enrolled in college in 2009, compared to the national college enrollment rate of 68% (see Exhibit 2). When enrolling in colleges, female ACE participants enter engineering programs at double the national rate of non-ACE counterparts.
The survey also found that 66% of ACE alumni are studying architecture, engineering, construction or the skilled trades, or are already working in one of these fields (see Exhibit 3).
ACE appears to be accomplishing its mission, based on the survey results. For a copy of the survey results, visit ACE’s website to download a complete report.
THE BIRTH OF A CHAPTER: TWIN CITIES, MINN.
In late 2010, Seth Hausman, head of operations, Construction Division, Zurich Insurance Company, attended ACE’s national board meeting and realized that the Minnesota’s Twin Cities did not have an ACE affiliate. When he returned home to Minneapolis, he contacted Paris Otremba, manager, Human Resources and Professional Development at PCL Construction Services, Inc., and Dylan VanAvery of Mortenson Construction, who were instrumental in planning this new ACE chapter.
P
aris, a board member on the Twin Cities affiliate, was instrumental in the formation of the chapter and continues to work diligently with the program to ensure its success. Dylan VanAvery is a quality engineer/engineer with Mortenson Construction and serves as ACE’s Twin Cities affiliate group coordinator. He tirelessly recruits mentors, coordinates the mentors with the students and observes the interaction between them to see how the program can be continuously developed and improved.
FMI interviewed Seth Hausman a couple of times about his involvement with the new ACE affiliate in the Twin Cities, first about the pilot program and later to learn how the first full year went.
Chisholm: How did you get involved in the ACE program?
Hausman: Actually, it was Hank Harris (FMI’s president) who got me involved. Hank had called Scott Rasor, president of Construction, Zurich, and me and thought Zurich should be involved with ACE for a couple of reasons. We didn’t really know much about ACE at the time, but took Hank’s word for it and jumped right in. I wound up on ACE’s national leadership council, and that was really the beginning of how we were engaged. After having some discussions with Hank and realizing the caliber of the organizations that are involved with ACE, it really became a natural fit for us. Many of our customers participate in ACE, and it’s such a worthwhile organization — how could you not be excited about what it is trying to do? What fascinates me is how so many significant national competitors come together for such a great cause, and everyone checks all of that other stuff at the door when they come in because it’s so important.
Chisholm: How did you get involved in your local (Minneapolis/St. Paul) ACE chapter?
Hausman: The local level was really an outcropping of last year’s national board meeting in October. One of the things covered in that meeting was what each of the local chapters were doing, and it hit me as I was sitting in that room that (we) were the biggest region without a chapter — the Twin Cities. Later, I mentioned this to Pamela, Catalina or one of the staff and was told there was talk of forming a chapter in the Twin Cities. I was put in touch with PCL locally, who was working a little bit with Mortenson — it was just about the time they were beginning to talk about it here.
It was at that board meeting that it really clicked in my head that Minneapolis/St. Paul was the biggest city without an ACE program. That really didn’t make sense, particularly knowing how involved this area is in volunteer activity and building the community. It was odd to me that the city didn’t have a program; so I contacted Paris at PCL and also Mortenson — that was in November. We had an initial little meeting with a couple of us, and things started to unfold quickly. We had a kickoff meeting with the construction community — it was the middle of December and a very, very cold, blustery day. Stephanie came from ACE, and it was one of the coldest days of the year. We had about a week and a half to invite people to this general information session, and we probably had one of the best introductory meetings ACE had seen around the country — after making a handful of phone calls to some key people, we filled the room with 50–60 people.
Chisholm: That did not give you much time to plan.
Hausman: What speaks to the level of commitment in the city is that we knew we were starting small. If you work with the timeframe, with the introductory meeting in December — we picked our board, which was about eight or so of us at that time and had our first board meeting in January. We kicked off our pilot program in April, so we had a very small amount of time. The whole point of the pilot program was that it was going to be a small start — we knew we were going to handpick our mentors from the companies represented by our board members, because we figured that was the easiest and fastest way to proceed, plus we planned for the initial mentors to become “mentors to the mentors” in subsequent years. In addition, we knew we were only going to have eight or 10 students for the pilot program, so we weren’t going to need as many mentors at first.
We held an open training session for the mentors in late March, and about 40 people showed up for it. They were all told that they were not likely to mentor for the pilot program, but it resulted in having a pipeline of mentors when the program really ramps up.
Chisholm: Who trained the mentors?
Hausman: Catalina Warrick (ACE’s director, Affiliate Relations) conducted the training. It was a couple of hours and covered some basic things. We had a really good mix of architects, engineers and contractors, which I know some of the other ACE chapters have struggled with getting that good balance. We made a point on our board to ensure that we had representation from the different disciplines (A/E/C). This was important so the students could get a cross section, and that one piece was not weighted more heavily than the others were.
Chisholm: What rocks in the road have you experienced?
Hausman: Timing was tough. We looked at each other in February and wondered if we could really pull this off for the spring. We knew it was going to be an abridged program, but still there was a lot to do — so that was challenge No.1. Picking the right people for the pilot was also a small rock — we had three or four high schools wanting to start and we had elected only to use one school for the pilot so we could see how things were going to work. I’m not sure if that was really a rock, but more of a challenge — We wanted to start small enough and not so fast that we would be overwhelmed. Also, there were some small scheduling and logistical problems that just go along with a project like this.
Initially, connecting with the high schools was interesting, because while we had many connections within the construction community, none of us had any connections with the schools, with the exception of a few of the larger contractors. There was some fishing around to determine whom the right people were to connect with — the right schools and faculty who were going to be engaged.
Chisholm: How did you decide on the project?
Hausman: That wound up being a half-hour brainstorming session with the board, and it was actually surprising how long it took for us to come up with it, because it was an obvious project for us in the Twin Cities and that was reconstruction of the Metrodome roof (place this in context with the snow collapse). We did talk about several other possible projects, but that was the obvious one. We wanted to come up with a smaller project since we were on a condensed schedule; so we knew we couldn’t do anything sizable. We wanted a project that had some degree of engineering because we had some engineering mentors. And we wanted a project that the students could relate to. The Metrodome hit on all of these.
Chisholm: How much were Charlie and Pam involved in setting up the chapter?
Hausman: Really, very little. Pam certainly from a discussion standpoint, but the legwork was done by Catalina and Stephanie.
Chisholm: How has Zurich benefited from your involvement with ACE?
Hausman: There are a couple of things. We look at the need for new, educated talent coming into the construction industry all of the time, and I think we see that as one of the biggest challenges for our industry. The goals of ACE are very much aligned with Zurich’s goals. So while these students are not going to work for Zurich, they are going to work for our customers. The program is extremely important to our customers because it’s going to drive construction and quality, which make our customers better, and that in turn makes Zurich better.
Secondarily for us is the continued strong connection that we have with the industry, and we feel very good about being involved with this program that attracts people to the industry. I think we (Zurich) have the opportunity to bring more of our contractor customers into the ACE organization. If we can have several of the larger contractors become engaged and see the value of ACE for their companies — I think that’s an important role for us.
Chisholm: Attracting people to this industry remains a big challenge, especially in these economic times. How do you feel ACE helps with this?
Hausman: The industry is changing so much, and one of the things that is important about this program is that it opens up the students’ eyes that there’s so much more to construction than laying bricks. That’s one of the benefits of this program — the kids see there is so much more to the industry, especially with all of the technological advances.
One of the things we would like to see Zurich more involved in is being a guest speaker at some of the chapters nationwide to talk about risk management, because that is a big topic for the industry that really isn’t part of the ACE program.
Chisholm: Is there anything you’d like to add?
Hausman: I think one of the biggest things for me with this particular chapter is that the engagement of the community has been overwhelming. I don’t think that there’s been a single architect, engineer, contractor or subcontractor that we’ve contacted to help us get the program started that has said “no.” Everyone has wanted to help.
FMI recently caught up with Seth to learn how the first full year at the Twin Cities chapter went and what was ahead for this year.
Chisholm: How did the first full year of ACE go?
Hausman: The first full year, we had three schools that participated, and they really went above expectations, in terms of how they performed overall. At the end of the program, they all had high-level presentations and products that came out of the work that they did. I think their projects all had different nuances and were all a little bit different. Keeping the program itself the same, we certainly learned things as we went through the process with the three schools that we didn’t in the first year. We had a total of 25–30 students who participated.
Chisholm: Were there any repeat students from the pilot program?
Hausman: There were a few repeat students, but since the pilot program was just at one school, many of them had graduated.
Chisholm: How did the expanded program differ from the pilot? I’m sure it was longer.
Hausman: Yes — it ran from October to March. We had more mentors since we had three schools participating. We included two field trips during the course of the program, which we didn’t have the opportunity to do the first time around.
Chisholm: Where did you go on the field trips?
Hausman: One was a school administration project, and the other was a hotel. I went to the first one, where we wound up doing a scavenger hunt on the project site. Actually, it was a controlled scavenger hunt so it wasn’t total chaos. The project team identified a handful of items for the students to go find and photograph, and it was somewhat of a challenge for each team to go and find them all before coming back to the job trailer. It was fun, and they did it late in the afternoon so there wasn’t any construction activity going on. Each of the teams had a captain/coach from the project team, so they were being supervised and mentored as they were going through the process.
Chisholm: What project did the student’s work on for their year-end presentation?
Hausman: All of teams worked on an in-town parking deck. We had one team who submitted its project for ACE’s national competition — it wasn’t selected, but it did go as far as making a submission.
Chisholm: How many mentors did you have? I remember from the pilot program there was much interest from industry firms.
Hausman: Yes, there was. If you look at the upcoming program that’s just beginning to start, we’re going to be in five or six schools this year, so we’re adding even more mentors. The challenge on the mentor side continues to be making sure you have the right teams put together with the right time commitments, because there is a fair amount of time spent by the mentors. There are people who would like to do it, but end up on a full-time project site and really can’t get there. That’s been one of the challenges — it takes a lot of finesse to make sure that the mentor teams are correct. Luckily, we’ve had a fair amount of interest that has increased because we increased contractor participation over the course of the year.
Chisholm: How many students do you expect to participate this year?
Hausman: It should be somewhere north of 50 kids this year, with five or six schools.
Chisholm: What will the project be this year?
Hausman: That has not been determined. The national project list that has a handful of choices will be out in the next few weeks, and we will choose one of those so that all of the schools are doing the same thing. That’s what we did last year with the parking deck. Doing one project makes the mentoring process easier, because we only have to build one curriculum. One of the things we learned from last year is that having a standardized curriculum is more effective and efficient for the mentors rather than letting them run by the seats of their pants.
Chisholm: How often do the students and mentors meet?
Hausman: Twice a month.
Chisholm: In addition to the time commitment needed from the mentors, are there any other challenges?
Hausman: Yes, and I think we touched on this earlier, and that’s ensuring that there is an engaged and proactive faculty member at each school. It’s more than just finding the school to participate – we really need an engaged sponsor, and we’ve been so fortunate to have found those people in all the schools we’ve worked with.
Chisholm: Where do the meetings take place?
Hausman: The students meet at their respective schools to eliminate any transportation issues. They do come together for the field trips and the year-end presentation.
Chisholm: How are you locally promoting the ACE program?
Hausman: There are two different vehicles. The construction side is through the contractors who are already participating with their partners, their subcontractors — whomever they’re working with. In the schools, it’s really up to that lead teacher to do most of the promotion, although we will go into the schools at least once to try to help promote it.
Also, last spring we held a contractor’s breakfast to increase engagement within the construction community, and it was really, really, very well attended. For a while, it was just a handful of the larger contractors in town that were driving the show, but we had an outstanding turnout at the breakfast to get involvement from the local construction community.
Chisholm: Anything else?
Hausman: We’re still running and gunning — it’s still fun, and certainly worthwhile.
CONCLUSION
The ACE Mentor Program has a presence in more than 200 American cities and is still growing. Thanks to the dedication of ACE’s mentors and staff, and the support of local schools, more than 60,000 students have had the opportunity to explore the building, design and construction industry and consider it as a career choice.
How can your company join an established ACE program? Please refer to the map of ACE locations on ACE’s website. Contact the regional coordinator in that area, or contact ACE’s national office at 703.942.8101 for further information.
If your area does not have an affiliate program and you are interested in starting one, please contact John Strock, ACE’s executive director, at 703.942.8101 or via email at jstrock@acementor.org. ■
Charles Thornton, Innovator
Charles H. Thornton, Ph.D., P.E., founding principal of Thornton Tomasetti Group, an international design firm, was the driving force behind getting the ACE program started, and he has worked tirelessly over the years to attract and encourage high school students to enter the A/E/C industry.
In 2011 the ACE Mentor Program announced that it was one of eight recipients of the prestigious 2010 Presidential Award for Excellence in Science, Mathematics and Engineering Mentoring (PAESMEN). In learning of the award, Thornton said, “I’m incredibly proud for ACE to be recognized with this prestigious honor. I take enormous pride in being part of an organization that helps to find and inspire young men and women who likely would not have chosen these careers, if not for our outreach and mentoring. This award is a wonderful recognition of ACE’s success. Bust most important, the men and women who have taken our help and gone on to spectacular careers in architecture, construction and engineering are our true validation.”
Thornton also praised the mentors by saying, “All ACE mentors share in this moment, as they are the lifeblood of our organization. It is because of their dedication, time and effort that we are able to reach and inspire wonderful young men and women.”
Thornton accepted the award in a White House ceremony, and the ACE program received an award of $25,000 from the National Science Foundation to advance mentoring efforts.
ACE Mentor Program FAQs
Q: How is ACE organized?
A: The ACE Mentor Program is made up of affiliates. Each affiliate serves high school youth within a certain region or city.
Each affiliate can have a number of teams. A mentoring team typically includes an owner firm, an architectural or design firm, engineering firms representing several specialties, a construction manager, a general contractor, sub-contractors and skilled craft workers. This team is then matched with a team of students. The number of student teams that an area may have is determined by the number of mentor teams in place.
Each team will have a lead firm. The mentors on the lead firm will be responsible for scheduling meetings and coordinating activities.
Q: What is my firm’s commitment?
A: The main commitment a company makes is empowering its staff to give time to the ACE Mentor Program.
Teams meet in an after-school setting during the school year. A total of 15 to 20 two-hour sessions are held at either the school or the offices of the mentors. A firm’s time commitment is approximately 30 to 40 hours each school year. Additional time may be necessary to organize for a mentoring session.
Many firms provide refreshments for the students and supplies that may be needed to complete a related activity.
Q: What happens during the season?
A: Activities that take place during the season may include:
- Registration events
- Mentoring sessions with the students where they are introduced to segments of the industry and complete activities
- College nights
- Field trips
- Special speaker presentations
- Project development —each team must conceptualize, design and create a project
- Final presentations —student from each team gather together to present their projects to each other, parents, teachers and industry leaders
- Scholarships presentation events
Q: What qualities make a good mentor?
A: Mentors are dedicated professionals who are passionate about what they do and want to share that with the next generation of the industry’s workforce. Ideal qualities for a mentor are enthusiasm and the ability to develop a rapport with the students.
Young mentors often can relate to the students more readily, but mentors of all ages have been very successful. In addition, the closer the diversity of the mentors matches that of the students, the easier it will be to form strong relationships.
Q: What are the benefits to my company?
A: Besides feeding the pipeline with the next generation of construction industry workforce, your company will benefit from its involvement with ACE. The program:
- Enhances your company image, within the industry and also the community
- Provides networking opportunities, for both mentors and principals
- Connects your firm to talented and motivated part-time help and to potential future employees
- Enhances young professionals’ presentation and communication skills
- Creates an opportunity to “give back” to your community and to your industry
Source: ACE Mentor Website
Kelley Chisholm is the editor of FMI Quarterly. She may be reached at 919.785.9215 or via email at kgchisholm@fminet.com.