Forging Futures: Real Stories from Our Graduates

It was late in my junior year in high school and I was not looking at colleges, not knowing what I wanted to do except I knew I wanted to work outside and work with my hands. I would scroll through TikTok and y’all randomly popped up on my page and I started looking into it more and realized what y’all offered. We saw we could do a tour so we planned a visit and got all the information we needed. I knew I wanted to come here especially after y’all said you can teach us starting from not knowing anything at all. Graduated high school and I was accepted to the school and 3 months later I was on my way to Wyoming. Started a week later and met some awesome people and really cool instructors. They taught and helped me figure out absolutely everything and I graduated what felt like only a short 3 months later. Got a job about 3 months after and I started a TIG welding job and it wasn’t even like I stopped welding. Got right back into my groove and I’m now looking for somewhere new to go, preferably downhill because I had a lot of fun doing it in school.

From high school, I went and was a labor building bridges and then I was a pile buck for about a year then I was welding but didn’t love structural so I saw WWA and said I’m going. october 24th I made the drive from Grand Forks to Gillette Wyoming in search of being able to be called a hand. I started out behind, wasn't really being serious, and then a man named Colton Pfeil became my lead on third, and at the end of it, I was a month ahead. the people I met at WWA will be my friends for life and now 6 months later I talk to about ten of them daily. I would go back and do it again and again if I could but now I’m chasing shutdowns up north. landed myself in a sugar beet plant and have been here for about five months now. a ton of stainless welding and carbon too, it’s about done so I’m excited to see where I go next.