Pickens Technical College’s Construction Technology Program Building Its 50th House
Pickens Technical College’s Construction Technology Program is a popular one. It turns students into expert construction workers capable of getting jobs with some of the largest and most promising firms in the state. With housing developments and other construction projects dotting the greater Denver area, the opportunities for construction workers to find work, especially if they have the skills that Construction Technology instructor Greg Shamburg drills into their heads from the start of his class, are manifold. Shamburg’s program is at work on its 50 th house in the Aurora area for families in need.
The Construction Technology program at PTC doesn’t just give students handbooks on how to swing a hammer, it puts students out on job sites throughout the community to give them the chance to learn how to build houses from experts in the field while working in the field themselves. You’ll never learn how to work on houses by reading about it in books. Shamburg and his teaching aides ply students with classroom instruction in addition to their work on job sites building houses that are placed on the open market. You couldn’t be in a better place to learn how to be an effective and efficient construction worker if you live in the Denver area, with all kinds of construction projects going up all the time. Some commentators have noted that the crane is now Denver’s official bird.
Greg Shamburg helps students reach their potential by giving them the benefit of his 27 years of educating students on a variety of different kinds of construction, including cabinetmaking, construction technology, and construction supervising. As a construction worker and supervisor himself, Shamburg has worked on remodels, room additions, new construction projects, framing, and exterior finish work. During his long career at PTC, Shamburg has been the department chair and served on the industrial leadership team, the Colorado State Faculty Curriculum Committee, and the Colorado Content Collaborative in Assessment Development. He holds both a City of Aurora Contractors License and a City of Aurora Class B Supervisors License and serves on the Board for Child Rescue, Inc.
If you take a class with Shamburg at PTC’s Construction Technology class, you’ll not only get to work with a nice guy like Shamburg, you’ll also learn many essential skills for a career in construction in the classroom and on the job site. You’ll learn how to read blueprints, estimate construction and remodel costs, read and interpret different kinds of building ordinances and codes, construct frames and frame rooves. In addition, you will also learn to construct the floor, walls, and roof of a residential home while using all of those nifty but potentially dangerous power tools. And with Shamburg’s connections combined with PTC’s reputation in the local community, both bolstered by the construction program building houses in the area for families, you’ll have many opportunities to start a career in the construction industry as soon as you graduate.
The PTC Construction Technology program’s 50th house is scheduled to be completed by Shamburg and his students in May of 2016.