b'TRAINING & EDUCATIONNTCA National Apprenticeship Guidelines provide career road map in the tile tradeNTCA simplifi es DOL-approved earn as you learn opportunity By Lesley Goddin, EditorIf youve been in the tile indus- What it istryforanylengthoftime,youNationalGuidelinesfor knowoneofthemostcommonApprenticeshipStandardsfor themes is the shortage of quali- theNationalTileContractors fied labor to do the tile work thatAssociationprovidesastruc-isripeforthepicking.Anotherture that a NTCA member in any themeisthatfeweryoungpeo- statecanusetodevelopaDOL-plearechoosingatradeoverapproved apprenticeship program, college,sothetradeisstartingtailoredtotheneedsandgoals to age out. And still one moreoftheirindividualcompany.The is carving out a clear career pathprogramcombinesclassroom for those who enter the tile trade. time and on-the-job learning (OJL) TheNationalTileContractorscomponents in a two-year fi nisher Association(NTCA),a.k.a.Theprogramandathree-yearsetter VoiceoftheContractor,hasprogram.Itincorporatescourse-been working on a range of waysworkfromNTCAUniversityand to approach these problems. AndOJLintoahybridprogram.That now,withthehelpofateammeans apprentices are not locked ofstaffmembers,NTCAFive- intothe144hoursofclassroom Star Contractors and governmenttime and 2,000 hours of OJL and officials,theNTCAispleasedexperience. Instead, focus on core toannouncethattheNationalcompetenciesmeansindividual GuidelinesforApprenticeshipapprentices who excel can satisfy StandardsfortheNationalTilea reduced time investment in the ContractorsAssociationhaveOJL component, while still logging been approved by the Departmentthe 144 classroom hours. of Labor (DOL).Wevetakenthediffi cultyof 44 TileLetter | August 2019'