For many kids, construction equipment is cool. At Schlouch Incorporated in Berks County, they don’t just get to look at it\u2014they get to experience it firsthand.<\/p>\n
Adventure Day has become a longtime tradition at the full-service site development and construction company, giving employees’ children an inside look at the work their parents do every day.<\/p>\n
“It’s a good way for them to see what we do every day,” said Andrew Kelchner, Site Crew Coordinator.<\/p>\n
Company owner Barry Schlouch says the event began decades ago with a simple idea: Introduce children to the construction industry in a fun, safe, and memorable way.<\/p>\n
“I had the idea about 30 years ago and thought, ‘If we exposed the children of our employees, brought them out, let them have a fun day, a safe day in the equipment, see how we create blueprints\u2014from earthwork to asphalt paving\u2014it might inspire them to consider a career,'” Schlouch said.<\/p>\n
The idea has paid off. Several current employees attended hands on experiences like this as a child and say the experience inspired them to pursue careers in construction.<\/p>\n
Now, it’s the next generation’s turn.<\/p>\n
Throughout the day, families rotate through a variety of hands-on activity stations, giving kids the opportunity to learn about different aspects of the industry.<\/p>\n
“We do 30-minute stations, and we’ve got rides, equipment demonstrations, a pipe station, and an excavation site,” said organizer and Cemente Coodinator, Stayce Rowlands.<\/p>\n
One of the biggest highlights comes at the end of the event.<\/p>\n
“The grand finale is they get to ride in the equipment safely. They have a buddy seat,” Schlouch said.<\/p>\n
While the event is designed to create lasting family memories, organizers also hope it helps address the industry’s growing workforce needs.<\/p>\n
“I think more events like this, getting more kids involved, are going to help with that exposure and get more kids from all different backgrounds into the industry,” Rowlands said.<\/p>\n
Schlouch believes introducing young people to the trades early is more important than ever.<\/p>\n
“The trade is on fire. There’s great money to be made in the trades and a great living, so we need to encourage more people. These are very important jobs,” Schlouch said.<\/p>\n
And if any of the young visitors decide construction is the career for them, Schlouch says he’ll be ready to hire them when the time comes.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"For many kids, construction equipment is cool. At Schlouch Incorporated in Berks County, they don’t just get to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":252059,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[214,279,128,130,129],"class_list":["post-252058","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-reading","tag-_homepage_top_stories","tag-berks","tag-reading-city","tag-reading-city-headlines","tag-reading-city-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/252058","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=252058"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/252058\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/252059"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=252058"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=252058"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=252058"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}