North Technical High School students visited a local jobsite to get a better understanding of all the moving parts associated with an active commercial construction project. Students were visited by representatives from PayneCrest Electric, Drilling Services, and Weaver Steel, as well as a couple of North Tech graduates who spoke on their experiences as they are currently working full-time on this project. Special thanks to Trevor Becherer and the Centene Project Management team for opening the site and affording students with an amazing experience!

Our CCDI student Ben Hayes has been job shadowing with Clayco and its subsidiaries to learn about many of the different jobs within the industry. He is currently attending St. Louis University majoring in Civil Engineering.

Corey Freeman interned with Midwest Testing and worked in their laboratory testing the compressive strength of concrete specimens. The concrete is sampled at construction sites, the samples delivered to the lab for curing, then tested for their strength. Midwest Testing has enjoyed having Corey work with them in their lab!

CCDI Construction Academy kicked off its second campaign this August. Twenty-five students from nine local high schools met at the Clayco office for the introductory session. Students heard presentations from Tom Sieckhaus, Executive VP (Clayco) on project management, Tim Plescia (Clayco-Intern) on the Realwear Technology headset (a cutting edge technology being developed to help increase productivity, safety, and dramatically decrease the cost of doing business). Students also heard from Olivia Martin who came and spoke about National Society of Black Engineers (NSBE) and their Pre-Collegiate Initiative called NSBE Jr. and how her involvement in the program yielded over $250,000 of

The CCDI Build Our Future Scholarship recipients Kyah Donald and Trenton Kwasa were presented with laptops, laptop bags, power banks, thumb drives, and notepads. CCDI is proud to support these two exceptional students as they start their collegiate journey at St. Louis Community College in the Engineering Sciences program to cover their general education requirements allowing them to transfer into their chosen schools of Missouri S&T for Kyah and Washington University-UMSL Joint Engineering program for Trenton. Thanks to Clayco, Tim Kleczkowski, Sandra Marks, and Derek Maschek for all of their support throughout this process. Go Kyah and Trenton!!

CCDI is very excited to announce that we now have our first full-time dedicated employee, Program Manager Rachel Boemer. Rachel started August 8 and is based in Clayco’s St. Louis office. For the past six years, Rachel served as a high school teacher at an inner-city high school, Gateway STEM. She taught social studies and career development to 9th graders, as well as coached sports, sponsored clubs, and led student activities. Rachel’s passion is to improve the quality of urban education with the help of community partnerships and nonprofit programs like that of CCDI. To reach Rachel, please contact [email protected]