PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — Girl construction camp is underway for the 12th year in Philadelphia.
The free program for inter-city youth stretches over six weeks at various sites, and the first week is all about safety.
Using a 20-pound fire extinguisher, volunteers put a fire. Knot tying and
emergency response on a construction site was also taught.
The girls in the program, which serves middle school and high school students, will also visit actual construction sites and trade union halls in the coming weeks.
Totiona Long, 17, is going into the 12th grade. She wants to go into the electrical engineering field, and she joined the girl construction camp two years ago.
"I believe that women can do basically everything that men can do, but a little better," she said with a laugh.
"It’s a really good camp. To learn more. Experience more. Hands-on and everything, it’s really good.”
The camp is officially called MyWIC, or Mentoring Young Women In Construction.
Camp co-chair Michelle Paxton said the number of women pursuing careers in construction is increasing.
“It is much better than it was five years ago, so we are very excited to see that more women are getting involved In the industry," Paxton conveyed.
"A camp like this gives young women the opportunity to see what kind of opportunities are out there for them, and that they can be a part of the construction world.”
Last year, the camp was held virtually due to the pandemic.
Zara Nielsen, 12, is glad to be able to participate in person this year.
“I wanted to be able to have some fun times with people, and to see if this is something I wanted to get into later on in life,” she said.
“We primarily focus on retail," said Rob Almond, CEO of NEST, a facilities management company that is helping to mentor the girls.
"The new store layouts are a lot different, wider spaces, a lot of self check outs, so think about all of the labor that you need for installation, planning, architecture, etc. Parking lot reconfigurations, because curb side is so much more popular. Engineering is involved. All of those different positions are the foundations of what this camp has today.”