East Lyme – High School junior Gavin Winchester’s goal is to land a job at General Dynamics Electric Boat, and the timing is right.

The East Lyme school district this year rolled out the new Pathways program focused on building the skills and connections to foster what East Lyme High School assistant principal David Fasulo calls a “win-win” situation – providing skilled workers for competitive companies willing to pay well for them.

Electric Boat President Kevin Graney earlier this year said the company plans to bring in 5,750 new hires this year alone, including 1,300 trades workers in Groton. U.S. Rep. Joe Courtney, D-2nd District, has predicted the company could be ramping up production to levels not seen since the Cold War.

Winchester, 16, was hired as a summer intern through Electric Boat’s carpenters union. The job description promises the chance to work side by side with experienced employees to learn firsthand about shipbuilding processes and tools.

The teen credited the Pathways program with giving him training in various trades that made him a more attractive candidate on paper.

“I was able to load my resume with all different kinds of stuff that Electric Boat uses,” he said. “I had experience prior to the internship.”

Winchester learned how to change tires and oil at Firmin’s Garage in East Lyme, how to weld virtually and in real life at Porter & Chester Institute in New London, and how to install metal framing at the North Atlantic States Carpenters Union Training Center in Wallingford.

The high school junior, no stranger to shop classes in construction, transportation technology and woodworking, identified his mother as the one who made him sign up for the extra job training opportunities.

Now he has his eyes set on a welding career at Electric Boat.

“I’m glad I was forced into it,” he said.

‘Hire for character’

Chris Jewell, president of the Bozrah-based Collins & Jewell manufacturing company, exemplified the Pathway program’s win-win philosophy when he hired David Day to start work upon his June graduation.

Day was offered the job along with a young woman from Norwich Free Academy after they attended an eight-hour welding workshop at Collins & Jewell this winter. The group included other students from East Lyme and Norwich.

Jewell said the all-day class was divided into classroom fundamentals and hands-on metal arc welding techniques.

“They were doing horizontal and spray arc; they were doing vertical. Some of the kids even messed with overhead a little bit,” he said.

The instructors for the workshop were part of the Manufacturing Pipeline Initiative, a program from the Eastern Connecticut Workforce Investment Board on which Jewell serves as chairman. The program is a national model for recruiting unemployed or underemployed workers who don’t necessarily have experience in the field.

“Our big mantra right now is ‘hire for character, train for skill,’” Jewell said. That means looking for students who ask questions, are eager to learn and are willing to try new things.

The custom steel fabrication company gets a lot of its orders from Electric Boat, according to Jewell. It also competes with the submarine builder for what currently amounts to a 72-person workforce in Bozrah.

He said he hires about four students out of high school every year. Those who come with no experience start at $17 an hour, while those who can show specific skills earn a higher paycheck.

Narrowing the options

Fasulo said Superintendent of Schools Jeffrey Newton and the Board of Education tasked him last year with starting the Pathways program as a way to capitalize on the state’s workforce training focus as well as the pressing need in southeastern Connecticut.

The Pathways coordinator said his career exploration strategy involves finding partners with the resources to teach what can’t be accommodated in the school.

“We lost our auto shop in the ‘90s. So now we have Firmin’s Garage,” he said. “We have Porter & Chester right up the road now. We can never make a welding space that high end here.”

He said the Pathways program is funded this year by $75,406 in federal, state and local grants.

Plans for the upcoming school year include an emergency medical technician certification course with support from the Eastern Connecticut Workforce Investment Board. By next June, seniors who pass the test can be hired directly as EMTs or can use the certification toward a career in other public safety or medical fields.

Senior Trevor Batchelor, 18, attended several of the programs offered this year through the Pathways initiative. After the Porter & Chester Institute session gave him an introduction to plumbing, carpentry, welding and the dental assistant field, he signed up to pursue plumbing in the fall.

One thing that doesn’t interest Batchelor is anything to do with dentistry.

“It really wasn’t for me,” he said. “There’s some people out there that that’s their cup of tea, and more power to them.”

Fasulo cited that kind of discovery as a strength of the Pathways program that can work in a lot of different ways. Sometimes, kids who think they want to head in a certain direction try it out only to find they don’t want to go there.

Winchester, the student who will be starting his Electric Boat internship this month, said exploring different career pathways is good for those who don’t know what they want to do as well.

“Because the worst thing that’s going to happen is you don’t like it, and then you just don’t have to do it,” he said. “It helps you narrow down the things that you want to do and don’t want to do.”

e.regan@theday.com