Ottawa to give $290,000 to SIAST for apprenticeship program

“They can actually complete the course here now in PA,” Hoback said after the announcement. “Before, they could go to a certain level of the course and then they’d have to complete it in Moose Jaw. Now, they can complete the entire course here in Prince Albert.”

SIAST will use the new funding to purchase six electrical stations, 12 programmable logic controllers, high-voltage meters and circuit boards.

SIAST president and CEO Larry Rosia called today’s announcement “icing on the cake.”

“Just a year ago, we cut the ribbon on a 6,500 square foot facility to allow us to allow us to allow electrical training on this campus,” he said during his speech.

He said the $2.5-million project was cost-shared between the federal and provincial governments and allowed the school to provide the classroom and shop space for levels one through three of the program.

Rosia said over the past five years, enrollment in apprenticeship training at the school has increased by more than 80 per cent.

“This new equipment acquired and the funding announced today will allow us to train 48 level four electrician apprentices in Prince Albert,” Rosia said.

And that’s welcome news for second-year electrical apprenticeship student Eric Nateweyes. When he received a letter saying he would attend the Woodland Campus for the second level of the program, it also said he’d have to attend Palliser Campus in Moose Jaw.

“Now, being from La Ronge, you know, the map, you can see … how I was confused about [it]. Like, why would they send me all the way to Moose Jaw when they have a nice place like this at Woodland,” he said. He said he knew SIAST was undergoing upgrades to its classrooms to accommodate the “influx” of new students.

“So, I wanted to be here,” he said. “For that, and also to be close to home.”

He attended his first year in the program in Melfort and has been working for Humboldt Electric in Humboldt for more than a year and a half.

After the announcement, he said as a resident of La Ronge, he’s glad this will mean he’ll closer to family and less travel.

“Because, when you travel, it costs money. Less travel I have to do, less money I have to spend. So, it makes sense.”

And after the announcement, SIAST board chair Ralph Boychuk said this announcement will really help support the family life of the program’s students.

“The travelling from the North to Moose Jaw was a big, cumbersome process and very expensive in a lot of ways, so this means a closer bond with the family. And when there’s that happiness they can get their studying done,” he said.

He said the expansion has been in the thinking stage for some time, but “the reality piece is probably in the last year with the extension of the facilities here in Prince Albert and obviously the programming changes that came about which allowed us to deliver that in Prince Albert.”

And it’s important to fund training for the skilled trades in not just Prince Albert, but all of Saskatchewan, Hoback said.

“If you go around the province, especially in my riding, when I go around the riding, you know I have employers looking to me ‘I need more electricians, I need more plumbers, more steam ticket engineers,’ and we’re just helping fill the need that is sitting there in Saskatchewan for those trades.”

Hoback said there is a definite skills trade shortage – right across Canada. In the pre-budget talks, he said it’s one thing that came up over and over again.

“In Saskatchewan, it used to be that there wasn’t any opportunity. Now there’s all sorts of opportunity, we’re being limited by the number of employees we’re able to find and hire, so now, we’re starting to fill that need too.”

tjames@panow.com

On Twitter: @thiajames

by Thia James

Ottawa to give $290,000 to SIAST for apprenticeship program

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