Junior high school counsellor Marg Hansen often helps her students make decisions about their future career paths, but until she donned a hard hat and fireproof coveralls, climbed up on a drilling rig and sat in a helicopter to view the boreal forest, she had no real inkling of how many exciting jobs are out there.
"To see and learn about the technicalities and the intricacies of jobs in the oil and gas sector, and to see the vastness and the beauty of the boreal forest, and then to realize all the many opportunities for employment, was spectacular, said the Sir George Simpson teacher.
Hansen was one of 15 teachers from all over the province who spent two days learning about environmental and natural resource careers in the oilpatch and in the forestry industry.
The professional development workshop, which ran Sept. 22 and 23, was arranged by Inside Education, a non-profit charitable organization supported by the Government of Alberta and several key industrial leaders. Its role is to support teachers and help them learn about natural resources throughout the province. It has done so for 26 years throughout Western Canada.
"Inside Education focuses on understanding multiple perspectives related to the science, issues and development of natural resources and the environment," said program manager Kathryn Wagner.
Safety first
Like Hansen, most of the teachers at the workshop were counsellors and many were women. For them, climbing the steps to the Enform oil and gas training site in Nisku, was as strange and frightening as it must be to mount the steps to a spaceship launch pad.
Enform instructor Bill Tinkess did not whitewash the potential danger of oil industry jobs but instead stressed the same cautions he teaches every roughneck and every new battery operator.
"You will see real equipment and an operating drilling rig and you will you receive a complete safety orientation," he said.
The safety precautions were stressed again and again as every person on the tour was asked to sign in, so that their whereabouts could be accounted for in case of emergency. Then, as teachers pulled on fireproof clothing, Tinkess pointed to the mustering location where everyone would gather in case of fire or explosion.
Next he pointed to the several storeys high platform where his rig-hand students learn how to work at great heights. Safety harnesses hung from the top of the equipment and beneath the platform there was a deep tumbling mat.
"That's where they learn how to properly fall off a rig," he said with a grin, bluntly explaining at the same time, that the real purpose was to teach students not to fall.
"We want them to learn that if they fall from the top of a rig, it's over," he said.
Outside, the teachers craned their necks to look up and watched with mesmerized fascination as the current crop of Enform students manoeuvred a pipe above an oil well.
"How long will the pipe be?" asked Bellerose mechanics teacher Ben Siemers as the roughnecks hurried to grab the pipe.
"Depends how deep the well is," answered Tinkess, adding that the weight of 10,000 feet of pipe could complicate the drilling procedure.
As the teachers toured a gas wellhead, learned how sweet gas is separated from sour gas and saw an operating pump jack, they got a clear explanation of the technical aspects of the oil industry.
Hansen asked what prerequisites students would need to work in the industry.
"I don't understand the technicalities of what he is showing us but that's not my purpose," she said. "I'm here to learn what jobs are out there and what background training people need," she said.
All the teachers were keen to learn about potential salaries for their students.
"I get asked that question all the time. But also, more and more, I get industry phoning me to ask for students (to work)," said Siemers.
"Your students could be control-room operators, or instrumentation people or they could start work right out of high school at an entry level making perhaps $30,000 to $35,000," Tinkess said. "If they are working at a senior level they would make well over $100,000."
Boreal forest
The teachers travelled by bus from Nisku to Whitecourt for a day-long, behind-the-scenes look at the kinds of jobs that employ people in the boreal forest.
"We were able to see the importance of the boreal forest and to see the impact, both positive and otherwise of industry on that region," said Bill Turnham, from Bellerose Composite High School.
Turnham, who heads up the Work Experience and Registered Apprenticeship Program (RAP) at Bellerose, was keen to learn the pay scale of workers, especially those in the trades, in both the oil and lumber industries. He liked talking to employees in both sectors.
"It was very much an eye opener to learn the subtleties and idiosyncrasies and get what it truly means to work in those areas," he said. "We felt the passion of people who are excited in their jobs and who shared the challenges they faced to get where they are."
Turnham said the workshop helped him realize how many opportunities there are for both young men and women in the trades in Alberta. He made connections with industrial leaders, which will be useful to his RAP students when they look for work. He talked to people in both industries to learn how they got their jobs and what training and education they had.
"I was able to talk to the pilot who flew our helicopter. I met professional foresters — both men and women — and I met forestry environmentalists. The number of jobs in the industry is beyond trying to fathom," he said.
From the front seat of a helicopter, Turnham could see how the forest is being used and also reclaimed. He saw the cutlines in the forest but was also reassured to see where the forest was reseeded.
"It's not something you always see on the ground or from the highway. We could see the future growth of the forest," Turnham said.
Bright future
Though Hansen's students are still in junior high school, they are already thinking of their future careers. Most have a stereotypical idea of the future jobs that may employ them, she said.
"Next spring we'll have a career day and now I can invite many of the people we met to speak to the students about their jobs," she said, adding that she was especially interested to meet a young woman working at Alberta Newsprint Company.
"She was a city slicker but now she's working in forestry and she was a good advocate because she was interested in the environment," Hansen said.
The teachers visited the Huestis Demonstration Forest near Whitecourt to see how trees are selected before they are cut.
"We took a core sample of a tree," Hansen said.
The workshop also helped the teachers to gain a positive outlook for the future economy of the province and also for the potential employment of their students even several years down the road.
"There are many lucrative opportunities. There are work-experience opportunities now and industry is looking all the time," said Siemers.
"Plus, if the trend continues, there will be jobs for many years to come as the environment is sustained and industry works to keep itself viable."
