This week marks the official launch of the Frame Your Future CTE curriculum! FYF will give students hands on experience in trade skills that they can use in a number of different construction career paths as soon as they leave high school. This program was created to aid in the critical worker shortage that the Construction Industry has been facing with increasing urgency for the past couple of years. Each year, more funding is cut from school budgets that has traditionally gone towards shop classes; Frame Your Future is an industry-driven, industry-funded solution. To date, Frame Your Future has been able to raise $200,000 with the help of industry partners; we are putting our money where our mouths are so that Spokane can have a secure housing future. 
 

Spokane is currently facing a Housing Shortage of more than 30,000 homes, and the builders that are working tirelessly to help fill this demand are extremely understaffed. In addition to the current problem, there is another one coming down the pipe that will lead to an even larger housing shortage later. One in four skilled workers will reach retirement age in the next ten years. Our already strained workforce is about to be stretched even thinner. Through its innovative trades training programs, Frame Your Future is bridging the gap between the classroom and the workplace by creating a skilled worker pipeline for residential construction. Innovation High School will be the first school to implement this program. 

 

This endeavor would not have been possible without the willingness of the Innovation High School teachers to adopt a new shop curriculum. Frame Your Future recognizes the challenges involved, and is working to address the Workforce Shortage inside and outside the classroom to ensure the efficacy of this pilot program. Just to name a few, these are some of the areas in which FYF is focusing its attention:

 

• Providing exposure to the trades 
 and introducing construction-
 based curriculum beginning as 
 early as middle school 

• Facilitating hands-on building 
 projects in high school and using 
 industry-driven curricula with 
 lessons on energy efficiency and 
 the home of the future

• Summer internship placement 
 and direct-hire opportunities… 
 and eventually providing…

• Pre-employment and on-the-job 
 training for adults

 

The Spokane Home Builders Association, the Associated General Contractors of America, and other industry partners are done waiting for the state to solve this problem. It has become clear that the focus on funneling kids into four-year college degree paths is going to continue. We have to show kids that there is another way; there are so many more options that can provide them with stable income and employment for life. Together, we will inspire and empower young men and women to pick up their tool of choice and build something incredible! OUR FUTURE.

 

A special thank you to all of our partners who have stepped up to address this crisis, and support the goal that Frame Your Future is trying to achieve. 

 

 Condron Homes

• Compass Construction

• Hayden Homes

• Greenstone Homes

• Fred’s Appliance

• Lanzce Douglass

• Spokane Association of Realtors

• Parr Lumber

• Washington Trust Bank

• Windermere Real Estate

• Band Construction

• Really Clean Energy