A pilot program named "Aces Construction Exploration", aimed at attracting high school students into the labor-short construction and contracting fields was developed at East High School in Wichita, Kansas in the Fall of 1999.  The two-year program provides 25 students (selected through an interview process by the school's counselors) an opportunity to explore 12 construction trades.  

During the students first year, they learn about the trades from professional craft workers in a classroom setting.  The dozen crafts offered include heavy equipment operation, pipefitting and plumbing, roofing, brick and concrete masonry, electrical, metal building assembly, ironworking, carpentry, painting, sheet metal, HVAC, and glaziers.  Students learn the basic of the trades during their junior year.  

The students will have an opportunity to be employed at one the the 11 sponsoring construction/contracting sites the summer between their junior and senior year.  They will learn more about specific trades in which they have an interest.  

The student's senior year will provide them an opportunity to focus more in-depth on four trades they select.  The goal is for the students, upon graduation, to be prepared with the basics to enter the construction industry and choose a trade as a career.

In the Fall of 2005, students got a rare and exciting opportunity to work on the set of ABC's Extreme Makeover: Home Edition, using skills that they have been taught in the class to volunteer their time to help build a house for a Wichita-area family who was selected for the show.

For more information on the Wichita East High School Construction program, click here.

Students from the Wichita East program work on a house for an episode of ABC's Extreme Makeover: Home Edition.