Building Futures Together: The Sack Company & Statesboro High School
Empowering students with hands-on experience & career opportunities
September 20, 2024 - A local contractor is doing more than building structures—they're building futures through a partnership with a local high school construction program.
The Sack Company and Statesboro High School’s Architecture and Construction program are working together to not only provide students with practical, hands-on experience at construction sites, but helping youth see the career possibilities in skilled trades.
The company is actively engaged with Josh Hall, Statesboro High School Construction teacher, and his students. Sack employees also serve as members of the program’s industry advisory council. They bring their expertise of the area labor market, the skills and competencies needed for specific occupations, keep the program connected to the changing knowledge, skills and tools needed, and make recommendations for improvements to the program’s curriculum, equipment, or facilities. They also employ graduates of the school’s Construction program, including three recent hires in May 2024.
Statesboro High School Construction students and The Sack Company employees cutting the ribbon on the tool and equipment storage building they built together.
Heath Waters, an assistant electrical project manager with The Sack Company, speaks with Statesboro High School students about job skills and career opportunities in his field.
Joseph Powell (left), a workforce development specialist with The Sack Company, speaks with Keith Wright, the principal of Statesboro High School and two of the school's guidance counselors, Concella Holder and Laquanda Love.
A recent example of this collaboration is a tool storage building that Sack employees and Statesboro High School Construction students built together. While visiting the school’s Construction Lab, Joseph Powell, Sack’s workforce development specialist, observed that the program needed additional, dedicated space to store tools and some of its larger equipment. With supplies donated by Howard Lumber, Sack employees worked with students to build the shed.
“This is an excellent example of the importance and benefits of partnerships between Career Technical & Agricultural Education programs and industry,” said Bethany Gilliam, director of CTAE for Bulloch County Schools. “They heard of a need, and then went above and beyond to not only meet it, but give students the opportunity to come on their construction sites to gain hands-on experience. Allowing students these real-life experiences is crucial.”
Sack Returns to Statesboro High School
Powell and 14 other Sack employees recently returned to Statesboro High’s Construction Lab for a ribbon cutting on the new building and network with students and school administrators and guidance counselors. They also provided the group with a special bar-b-que lunch afterwards.
In operation since 1945, The Sack Company is a full-service contracting company specializing in mechanical, HVAC, electrical, plumbing, fire sprinkler, millwright and rigging trades.
Statesboro High School’s Architecture & Construction program is nationally certified by the Georgia Department of Education and Construction Ready, a not-for-profit organization which seeks to educate young people about the construction industry and Statesboro High School Construction skilled trades.The program is one of Georgia’s Career Technical and Agricultural Education program’s career clusters for high school students. Statesboro High currently offers the Carpentry career pathway within the program, which is one of 13 possible career pathways available within the state’s program. The Carpentry career pathway is a series of three courses - Industry Fundamentals and Occupational Safety, Introduction to Construction, and Carpentry I - which students can complete as well as obtain certain standard industry certifications to help them be immediately employable within the construction industry.
Career Technical & Agricultural Education
Career Technical & Agricultural Education prepares students for their next steps after high school, whether that be college, to begin a career, enter an apprenticeship opportunity, or enter a branch of our nation's military. Bulloch County Schools provides Career Technical & Agricultural Education career pathway courses developed by the state of Georgia and the Educating Georgia's Future Workforce initiative, which leverages partnerships with industry and higher education to ensure students have the skills they need to thrive in the future workforce. Georgia's Career Technical & Agricultural Education program offers students more than 130 career pathway options within 17 different career clusters. Bulloch County Schools currently has 40 different career cluster programs that offer 17 different career pathways of courses and their accompanying national technical student organizations.