Kitchen & Bath Business - May/June 2020 - 24

HOT TOPIC

NKBA TAKES ACTION

The 'A-Ha' Moment:
Kitchen & Bath Careers

NKBA helps spark passion & purpose among high
schoolers while addressing the skilled labor crisis

REMEMBER THAT MOMENT when a light bulb went off in your head? Suddenly - maybe unexpectedly - discovering a passion and purpose for a career.
NKBA member Tami Gamble-Gurnell was just six years old when she had
her career "a-ha" moment while helping her stepdad fix their home's water
heater and plumbing. She became a building and construction instructor, and
today - as the "The Girly Shop Teacher" - she partners with construction
companies to teach her hands-on "Girly Shop"class that provides youth with
the hard and soft skills that will prepare them for successful careers. 
Like Gamble-Gurnell had discovered, her students realized it wasn't unusual to think it was possible to make something from scratch or even repair
something like a toaster or a blender that had a faulty switch. It was real, and
it felt relevant to many young people as a path forward - as a career.
Yet, somewhere along the way, those opportunities to get hands-on with
tools, to get the satisfaction and the confidence that comes from learning and
doing, got lost. And with it were those moments of knowledge transfer, the
"a-ha" moments that create a lifetime of memories. 
Pair that with an educational message to a lot of kids that a four-year
college degree is their only route to success, and it's not just memories that
are lost. It's kids who can't see a path to imagining themselves as carpenters,
electricians, plumbers and fabricators - talent that's needed to support the
kitchen and bath industry.

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24-25_KBB_0520_HotTopic.indd 24

THIS SPREAD Students explore

kitchen- and bath-related
careers as the BridgeYear/
NKBA Career Tour launched
at a Houston high school
in January. Photos by Dee
Zunker Photography

By NORA DEPALMA,
NKBA contributing writer

Enter NKBA NextUp with the BridgeYear/
NKBA Career Tour and the NKBA Community  Restoration Project, two programs designed
to give high school students hands-on experience
with kitchen and bath careers. 
BridgeYear is an innovative non-profit that
enlightens students about career options through
Career Test Drive stations. In collaboration with
NKBA, BridgeYear developed simulations in finish carpentry, installation, kitchen and bath design,
plumbing, electrical and showroom sales. Students
are active participants,"trying on"kitchen and bath
careers at stations set up in their school gym. 
At the kitchen and bath design station, students
use computer-aided design to remodel a space
with cabinets, fixtures, surfaces and appliances.
Another station explores plumbing careers, in
which students pipe a double vanity to an actual
water source. At the station exploring electrician
careers, students wire a pendant light so it turns on
and off with a switch.
"When the BridgeYear/NKBA Career Tour
kicked off in January, I witnessed a real-life 'aha moment' when two teens worked together to
thread an electrical connection, flipped the switch,
and the light bulb came on...literally and figuratively," said Bill Darcy, NKBA CEO. "One of the
students told us after, 'I made that light go on...I
want to be an electrician!'"
To see this moment as it happened, click here.
"There's nothing like witnessing students' 'a-ha'
moments because they just discovered their career
passion through this type of hands-on experience,"

/ MAY-JUNE 2020 / KBBONLINE.COM / The official publication of NKBA (NKBA.org) and KBIS (KBIS.com)

5/11/20 12:44 PM
http://www.KBBONLINE.COM http://www.NKBA.org http://www.KBIS.com
Kitchen & Bath Business - May/June 2020

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