Westfield Vocational-Technical High School carpentry instructor Rick LaBay, right, and Garrett Kellam, left, a senior, work on the upper level of the new Park Square Pavilion Wednesday. (Photo by Frederick Gore)
WESTFIELD – This week, returning Westfield Vocational-Technical High School seniors in the Construction Technology shop taught by Brian Falcetti picked up where they left off last spring on the unfinished Park Square Pavilion.
“Our group has eight students, but I just had two go out on co-op so I’m down to six,” Falcetti said. He had 14 last year.
“We spent three days in June and three days this week,” he said. “So the progress you see here is six days worth of work.”
“We did the headers and the cripples for the doors and windows, and now we’re working on the arches that are going to go around the windows,” said Susan Mosijchuk, one of Falcetti’s senior construction students.
“We’ve got half-round windows going into the upper section, so they’re doing all the framing to complete the half-round rough framing for those windows,” said Falcetti. He said that the seniors were able to use a crane to assemble and put the steel onto the structure in June.
“They’re doing all of the infill framing for the doors and windows and sheathing the exterior,” he said. “The week of the 22nd, we’ll be bringing the trusses over and will start assembling the roof system that will be lifted up the first of October.”
Falcetti said that the trusses, though pre-manufactured, are still at WVTHS, where the students did pre-fitting work.
“Where the brackets go and their length – all that was pre-cut at the shop.” he said. “Next we’ll do an assembly on the Green where we’ll pre-assemble the roof and lift the whole thing as one unit.”
The eight-sided structure will have a bell-shaped roof, with a triple girder, with hips jutting off it on all sides.
Falcetti said that he and the students told Tighe & Bond and Reinhardt Associates, the project’s engineering consulting and architectural design firms, about the products they felt they could use to make the project work.
“These structures are already padded with 2-by-6s, so none of the drilling had to be done and the students could add steel to the steel without having to do all the extra work of drilling,” said Falcetti. “We picked a lot of the products and gave them our model that the students designed to show how we thought we could do it with students. So they (Tighe & Bond, Reinhardt) are just finalizing prints that our students designed and gave it the engineers’ stamp.”
“I don’t know that there are many challenges,” he said. “I didn’t expect them to get this far in three days, so they’re doing well. I think they’re filling the shoes of the old senior group nicely.”
“There are just not as many people to lift things, I’d say is the biggest problem,” said senior Xavier Haskins regarding the smaller number of students working on the pavilion, which prompted a nod of agreement from four other students. “We can’t get as many projects done at once.”
Falcetti said that last year’s senior construction students were a “pretty confident” group, but that he is happy with the pave that his current charges are working at.
“Over the winter, we’re hoping to do most of the interior here,” he said, pointing to the inside of the beefed-up frame. “It’s moving right along.”
As to what his students will be doing after graduation, most hope to stay with construction.
“I work for a flooring company in town, so I’m probably going right there after school’s over,” said senior Chris Bourbeau.
Faceltti said that one of Bourbeau’s classmates is looking to go to architecture school, while another Bourbeau cohort, Peter Golenev, said he might try his hand at being a union laborer.
“We have a union field trip coming up in the beginning of November.” said Falcetti. “We go to the Millbury Carpenter’s Training Center every year and show the students the opportunities that are available to them through the union.”
Falcetti stated that, of his 14 seniors last year, seven went on to college, one went in the military and the rest are out working in the field.
“We had so many calls over the summer we could put them all out to work,” he said. “Two of our seniors just started on a co-op with a contractor today. It’s our goal to get people employed.”
