28 Sep 2020

Reckon construction’s your calling? We reckon ya might be onto something there!

With perks like a great employment rate, the opportunity to travel and work, getting paid to learn, and not being stuck behind a desk all day, it’s hard to imagine that anyone wouldn’t love doing a trade.

However, getting into the building and construction industry can be a bit tricky if you don’t have the right resources at your disposal. Construction Skills Queensland (CSQ) have a great page for students with info on their awesome programs that help get ya up to speed with the industry, whilst showing you the way to a successful career.

If you dunno which trade to choose

If you’re keen on the building and construction industry but unsure which road you want to go down, then CSQ’s course selector is the ultimate starting place.

With a list of 70 careers in construction to choose from, you could say that trying to make up your mind is more than a little bit overwhelming. The course selector helps you figure out what careers might be best suited for you, then provides you with access to all the qualifications you need to turn it into a reality.

If you’re still at school

Kinda keen on the building and construction industry, but still at school? That can definitely make it a bit hard to figure out what trade you wanna do, or how you can go about pursuing one. You probably didn’t even know that you can actually start a trade whilst still at school.

That’s why CSQ run an initiative called Try’a Trade, in which students are sent along to an interactive program that lets them get a taste for different careers within the construction industry.

You’ll get a bunch of career advice from people with plenty of relevant industry experience, physically try out a bunch of different trades, and figure out what careers you might like to pursue. It might even help ya figure out which subjects to pick for your last years of school.

If you’re afraid of committing

Once you’ve figured out what trade ya wanna do, the next step is to dive head-first into a four-year apprenticeship, right?

Seems like an awfully drastic way to start a career. Imagine if the trade turned out to be nothing like what you imagined, but you’d already put so much time and effort into the apprenticeship that giving it up would seem like a huge waste.

Fortunately, CSQ run a program called Trade Start, which helps people get a taste of certain trades before they commit to a full apprenticeship or traineeship. Over 16 weeks, you’ll make some industry connections, get some real work experience under your belt, and gain an entry-level qualification that can go towards your actual training if you decide to follow through with the trade.

If you’ve already got some experience or skills

If you’re currently working in the industry, or have in the past, then there’s a chance that you don’t need to re-do an entire qualification just to re-join the workforce.

CSQ run a Skills Assessment and Gap Training (SAGT) program which helps you identify what skills you already have, what skills you are lacking, and what steps you need to take in order to fill in those gaps. That way, you don’t spend your time and money learning stuff you already know, and you still walk away from your training with a nationally-recognised qualification.

So there it is. Starting an apprenticeship can definitely seem intimidating at first, but with all these options you can rest assured you won’t be alone trying to start one. Good luck!