By Jack Voight, Sports Editor

Before stepping into the classroom, you are instructed to put a large protective gear on. The workshop, while its conditions are usually stuffy and sweltering, brings a sense of fulfillment to the students. Welcome to the welding classroom, a College of the Albemarle (COA) Career and Technical Education program, which has now become part of the dual-enrollment with COA through First Flight in the last few years.  

In this program, students can earn a degree in welding over two years, and immediately pursue a job in the welding field right out of high school. As well as the welding program, there are other technical programs that are offered to high schoolers, including H-VAC air conditioning and heating.

The students are instructed by welding technician and professor Jeff Spear, who has been a welding contractor for over 40 years now. 

“The Welding Technology diploma can take you anywhere you want to go in the industrial field,” Spear said.“From advanced manufacturing in welding, you can be a salesperson at a welding distributor, you can do repair work, and get a job fabricating and repairing at one of the shipyards in Newport News.” 

Currently, two First Flight high school students are enrolled in the welding program, junior Jacob Hutchins and senior Logan Mclemore.

“My grandfather told me about it and I grew fascinated,” said Hutchins. “I find the whole chemistry of being able to manipulate molten metal and being able to do whatever you want with it [interesting].”  

The class this semester is four days a week, Monday through Thursday, going from 1:30 to 5:00. Even though this schedule differs from the standard First Flight schedule, students become adjusted to schedules on the COA time. 

“You get a flat piece of metal and weld lines ‘til you’re tired of it,” Mclemore said jokingly. “It’s practice, lots and lots of practice. We work on lawnmowers and stuff, just little jobs.” 

And while the boys enjoy it, the course is still a rigorous one. 

“You come in as a junior, and the way the program is set here at Dare, we take you through in two years,” said Spear. “You come in the fall and spring semesters, and a summer semester, and then you go back as a senior and then they come through fall semester spring semester summer (again) they have completed the program.”  

After this, and completing the two required math courses, the student will have their welding technology diploma, and be able to immediately join the welding workforce — one that Spear says is in need of some younger employees. 

“American Welding Society says that 400,000 welding jobs are open in the United States, and the average age of a welder is 49 years old,” Spear said. 

With a wealth of available welding jobs, most people that complete the program go straight into a job in the field. So this program is providing high-schoolers an alternative to the four-year college or even community college path that students are oftentimes shoehorned into straight out of high school.

“There’s pipeline, underwater [welding] and structural welding, stuff like that,” Hutchins said in consideration of some of the different types of welding careers he could choose. 

Mclemore also has some ideas on what he wants to do with his degree once he graduates. 

“There’s a lot of traveling welding jobs where you get your own truck, and put your own welder on the back and travel the country doing odds and ends jobs,” Mclemore said. 

This program allows high school students, that may not want to be pursuing a degree at a four-year school, to have a reliable job out of high school and a plan for their careers. And this alternative begins with the free program provided by Dare County Schools and COA.  

Spear takes a lot of pride and joy in his welding instruction and loves to see his students go on and succeed. He says he finds a true passion for teaching young welders. 

“What I enjoy about it, so to speak, is seeing the light bulb come on, when they’re trying to achieve something, and it may be giving them a bit of a stalemate,” Spear said. “And [then] at the point at time when they walk up and they’re doing all they could to keep from smiling because they know that weld looks good before they even look at it.” 

Junior Jack Voight can be reached at [email protected].