Empowering Future Tradespeople at Medicine Hat College

Medicine Hat College has been a hub for trades education since 1984, offering more than 100,000 square feet of modern training facilities and enrolling nearly 500 apprentices each year across seven in-demand programs, including carpentry, welding, automotive, and heavy equipment.
In this episode, Brian explores how trades education is evolving, why outdated stigmas around skilled trades are fading, and how vocational training is gaining recognition alongside traditional university pathways. With smaller class sizes and hands-on learning, students receive personalized instruction that prepares them for real-world careers.
The conversation also highlights how industry collaboration plays a critical role in shaping the future of trades training. By working closely with local employers and responding to labour market needs, Medicine Hat College ensures its programs remain relevant—and that graduates are ready to step directly into the workforce.
👉 If you’re considering a career in the skilled trades or want to understand where Canada’s workforce is headed, this episode offers valuable insight.

Chapters

00:00 Introduction to Medicine Hat College's Trades Programs
02:50 The Value of Trades Education
05:55 Personalized Learning Experience in Trades
08:50 Pathways to Apprenticeship for Students
11:55 Skills Competitions and Industry Partnerships
14:52 The Role of Faculty and Support Staff

Thank you for listening and sharing you are one in a million! We are excited to announce our community is growing and we couldn't do it with out you! 

Hey we need your support. Like and subscribe to Bring Back The Porch Podcast

Transcript

0:00

Hey, this is Brian again. And I'd like to ask you to do a favor. We can't do this work without people like you. So if you can, please, like, share, subscribe. Tell your friends about bring back the porch. Take the equivalent of the first year of apprenticeship with us. It extends the hours they spend in the classroom and shop by about 1.5 times. So, they're with us for a period of time where they get that technical training and then they go out and build ours on the work site. So the training makes them more employable, more likely to be able to get on with a company that will register them as an apprentice. This episode of Bring Back the Porch, brought to you by Bernie Leahy, River Street Realty. Let's get you home. And joining us on the porch today from the Medicine College Morgan Blair, who's the dean of the School of Trades and Technology. And I'll use my cue card here for Jessica Hirsekorn administrative coordinator, Southeast regional skills coordinator, School of Trades and Technology. Yeah. Busy people are titles. Welcome to the porch. Thank you. A couple of weeks ago, we spend an afternoon out at the college, and you were kind enough to give us a tour of your facility, and it was jaw dropping. I had no idea of all the opportunities that you have for people to learn a trade at the Medicine Hat College, so I'm not sure where we should begin, but, just maybe an overview. Morgan, of of the programing. Sure. So we've had trades at the college since 1984. Like you mentioned, our our facilities are impressive. We have 100,000ft² of classrooms and shops where we educate and educate nearly 500 apprentices every year. So we have seven programs. We have, carpentry, steam fitting and pipe fitting, welding, automotive, heavy equipment, plumbing. I cover them all. Jessica. Electrical. Electrical. All seven is hard to remember them all, but, we educate apprentices who are coming through all periods of trades and going out into industry and working and keeping southeastern Alberta running. You know, when I was in high school, there was trade and vocational education, and those students were sort of looked upon as being a lesser because they were in the trades area. Is that stigma still there? I think elements of it still exist, but it's definitely changing. We're really recognizing the value of trades and the equity with which we should be considering them on par to a college or university education. Yes. How do you decide which, seven courses I could you do more or are you limited because of finances? Room space? Well, how do we decide what's what? The seven trades that we. Yeah. Yes. Okay. Yeah. I mean, some of it is sunk into historical decisions, but we look at labor market need we look at, workforce and, student demand. Certainly we work with industry to understand their concerns and where things are coming that may not show up in the labor market data that we look at. And then it is a matter of, you know, having the proper facility, the proper, staff available to teach that program, getting the right equipment and the program approvals for through the government. So there are some considerations to provincially about whether or not we're replicating programs across the province. Madison I College has the rare opportunity for students to come in and receive more personalized education. I know you were talking to us back in January about how, comparing a somebody's going to, institute in Calgary or Edmonton and the time and space they would get there compared to in your facility. Jessica. Well, we're because we're just smaller. We can offer that more one on one, 1 to 2, because when we look at our, theory portion of the education of trades, it's a 1 to 12. And then in the shop, we can offer more support for those hands on skills. Because when you're looking at an apprentice, they're not quite as a master of their trade yet. So their safety concerns along with that. So we're able to offer the additional support with instructors through lab aides and all kinds of things just to make sure they're working safe. And it gives that one on one. So we're able to look at the student and actually work with them to hone in their skills, maybe where they're not quite as sharp. Yeah. I think what impressed me was I think when we were in the welding area, every student had their own space with their name very personalized. It is. And the students appreciate that. And that's even if we get a student from out of our area when they come in. That's one of the things that they noticed. First off, they're like, oh, I'm not, you know, you know me by name. You can say something personal about me. And then they come back and because we're continuously keeping track of our students and when they finally finish their program, they're coming back with industry feedback to our instructors as well. So it's a very much a suspicious we we definitely work cycle with the students. Yeah. Morgan, you were saying that you try to look ahead and plan ahead for what might where the needs might be. How do you do that? Like we draw on a few different pieces of information. So we we look at labor market projections based on data that we, we get from various sources. We also look at our eligibility lists of, of apprentices in the region and waitlists for our existing programs. And we're always talking to industry. We have some great partnerships already established, and we are continually looking for new partnerships with industry within southeastern Alberta to understand what they're going through and, what their future needs might be. Cost. This does not come cheap. All of the equipment we saw big trucks, we saw all kinds of equipment in the carpentry area. How can you afford all that? That's a good question. You have friends in high places. You know, a lot of it is, is equipment that we make sure we take really good care of. And a lot of it, we we rely on industry partners to support us with. There are some grants, both provincial and federal, that we can occasionally take advantage of and that we watch for very carefully to make sure that we do so when they become available. But it's a combination of those things that keeps our shops in great shape and providing some of the best education in Canada for our apprentices. I know when I was taking training to be a broadcast journalist at Fanshawe College in London, Ontario, we were told that we were working on better equipment than what was in the industry. And when we got into the industry, yeah, that was that was true. How do you make sure that the people you're training are working on equipment that they're going to actually have their hands on when they go to work? Well, we, we work with industry to understand what they're using. So you'll see in our welding shop for example, the welders that we have are the ones that they would be using out when they get into industry. So that's a piece of it. We also look for things that we know aren't always going to be, you know, brand new shiny objects. So for example, we just brought bought a trailer to go on the back of a big truck and there's some rust under it, and that's great because that's exactly what students will be working with when they go into industry. And they're they're not going to be dealing with the brand new truck and trailer. It's probably going to be older equipment. So we make sure they get a variety. We want them to be exposed to cutting edge, top of the line brand new equipment, but we also want them to get their hands on to things. That's going to be more realistic so. They can understand perhaps. I think one of the instructors that we talked to, he had to go back to the beginning to teach something, so they understood where today's technology arrived. I thought that was that was quite an interesting, way of looking at things. How many students churn through the program and you're, you're a little different because they're not here from September to April. They're coming and going all the time. We offer, it gets anywhere from eight weeks to nine weeks to ten weeks, depending on the trade and where you are in your educational training for that. So we have, typically every eight weeks, that nine weeks, that ten weeks. So if you kind of space that out into the year, we take in probably close to about 6 or 7 different what we call intakes. And that's where students, do come to school with us. How do they apply? You have to actually go through my trade secrets, which is, run by the government of Alberta, which is I teach apprenticeship industry training, and then you can pick your institute from there. Once you're a sponsored apprentice, and then you can, register through that site. And then it comes to us at the Post-secondary institute. Okay. Somebody who's listening or watching. I'm not in the industry. I'm not unemployed. What do I do? How do I get in? And then you have pre-employment. Yeah. So there's a few different options. One is pre-employment. For those who aren't currently employed in the field, they can come and take the equivalent of the first year of apprenticeship with us. It extends the hours that they spend in the classroom and shop by about 1.5 times. So, they're with us for a period of time where they get that technical training and then they go out and build ours on the work site. So the training makes them more employable, more likely to be able to get, on with a company that will register them as an apprentice. Okay. You also have, ways that, students who are in high school can actually, I guess, progress into a trade. How does that work? So we're working with, Prairie Road School District right now to offer great some exposure to trades training through grades 10 to 12. So in grade ten, they get an exposure to a broad range of trades. All of our trades plus power engineering. In grade 11 they focus down on to two that they're more interested in. And then in grade 12 they have the option of completing pre-employment okay. So they can, start early. Right. And there's also the wrap program, which is the registered apprenticeship program that they can get involved with in their high school. And what they do is they become a, signed up apprentice and they can actually start working their hours in high school at their choice of trade, and then they can get credit as well. So when they're graduating from high school, they've already got an hourly base for the apprenticeship program, and then they can move through the apprenticeship program that way. Okay. You offer placement help to for students who come through the program, to find permanent employment, I guess because they're already apprentices that they have a job. But is there some help, some guidance in career, looking forward, like, where they're chosen field might go. Yeah. So we do have a career and employment center at the college that can support any of our post-secondary students. But our department specifically doesn't offer any placement. Okay. Skills is another one that I know. You're already smiling. You have a competition that is coming up in March with some of your students. How did they get into that? And I know they've done well in the past. They've done very well in the past. So that has to be endorsed from your local high school. If you're looking at our regional competition or what they call a secondary competition, and then to go to the college level of skills, that has to be endorsed by post-secondary institutes or two different kind of pass on skills. Okay. So what do we got coming up in March? March 6th is going to be our southeast regional skills. So we're drawing competitors from all of the southeastern regions. So as far as Hannah, all the way down to the both borders is our kind of our catchment area. And so they're going to come to the Medicine Hat College or to local high schools and show off their amazing talent in trades and hopefully win and go up to Edmonton to show us in provincials. And if they win in provincials. They go to nationals. And that is in Toronto this year. And unfortunately it's not a qualifying year. So with nationals, every second year is a world's skills, competition. And so we've been very fortunate, in southeastern Alberta, that we represented very well on that stage several times. Actually, I noticed when we took our tour, many, many banners hang proudly the name of students that have come in and actually succeeded in the programs. And those are our post-secondary winners. So those are strictly college students. But if you go to any high school in the region, you'll see skills banners hanging in their area that they show the awards from, wins that they've either done here in the southeast with us or the level of provincial or even national. Yeah. You mentioned you have a great partnership with people in the industry, but you can always use more. We can always use more. So someone who's listening or watching, how do they get Ahold of you? Well, they can go through the college website and find my email address. They can email me at any time. They can reach out to directly to Jessica, Jessica seems to know just about every human in the region. Relationships. Yeah, relationships are important, but we are open to working with anyone, even if they don't understand exactly how they want to support us or contribute or get involved in the conversation. The more friends we have, the better, because it takes a big family to raise an apprentice. It does. And, we're very thankful that the Melanson that college has this opportunity for the people of medicine hat on. I don't know, I was going to ask you, about the ages. Is it usually, younger people or do you get, you get old fossils like me walking through the door. We definitely get a mix. In pre-employment, we tend to see younger ages. But we have we have a variety of ages come through our shops especially, you know, because it is most of the trades are up to four years for periods of training, essentially. So, people yeah, we get variety. Okay. What is the most popular course? The hardest one to get into. Oh, we're talking about demand. Yeah. Electrical and heavy equipment technician. Yeah, yeah yeah, yeah. And that against matches the needs in the labor market. Yeah, yeah it does. Heavy equipment technician for sure is a very popular program and one where we have fewer available seats because we are constrained by shop space and whatnot. And is there a waitlist? There is. Yeah. I'll take. Yeah, yeah. So you have to be patient. You have to be patient and you have to be on it when registration opens up. So for all those listening who aren't going through pre-employment, who want to go into apprenticeship, registrations open in May and you have to be on it like a concert ticket. Oh, yeah. Have it open and yeah. Refresh refresh. Refresh refresh. Is there anything else you wanted to add that we haven't touched on in a little visit? I would just like to add that our faculty are what makes our programs, our faculty, our absolute experts in their field. They all come from industry, and the training and experience that they bring to the classroom, into the shop is phenomenal. They pour their hearts and souls into our apprentices and they mentor them, in a way that is truly top of the line. We educate some of the best tradespeople in Canada because our faculty care, and that's not always something that you see across the board. So that is what makes us special. You can mention family. That's yeah, that's the key word there. They're not just, student numbers. That's right. Yeah. The School of Trades is a big family. Yeah. I was to say, and it goes down to our lab eights that we have in the shops every day who are, supporting the instructors. They're getting shops ready. They're making sure the shops are clean. They're making sure that, items are purchased that they need for those programs or what we call consumables, so that we can actually offer the students what they need to do the task that's being taught. Right. So we have amazing lab aids as well in the shops helping out as well. Okay. Well, the Medicine Hat College Trades and Technology, something that you should investigate if you're looking, for a future. Thank you very much for the visit. Thank you. Thank you.