Sacred Heart Catholic school and parish community partner to teach trades
A Muenster tradesman teaches students how to work on boot jacks they crafted in the St. Joseph Workshop at Sacred Heart Catholic School in Muenster on Oct. 21. (NTC/Juan Guajardo)
MUENSTER — On any given weekday afternoon in Muenster, 10 students make their way into a repurposed shed tucked behind Sacred Heart Catholic School. Books and backpacks are set aside in exchange for tools and equipment.
First, the class session begins with prayer to St. Joseph, patron of workers.
They then gather around an experienced tradesman — their community teacher for the day — eager to learn the project that will occupy the next 40 minutes.
Today’s task: add a drain to a dummy wall. Constructed by the carpentry class with studs spaced 15 inches apart, the walls serve as practice ground for running electrical wire and installing plumbing.
Measurements, drills, saws, glue — all part of the lesson as Paul Bartush Jr. of Bartush Plumbing explains the day’s assignment. Soon, the students set off in pairs to begin their work.
A SAINT TO RELY ON
Students in the St. Joseph Workshop program meet every day, with a schedule designed to learn one trade each day, five days a week.
Midway through its first year, the program is capped at 10 to accommodate space limitations and allow flexibility as the structure takes shape. So far, students studied OSHA guidelines and explored everything from electrical work and plumbing to small engine repair, carpentry, and welding.
Looking on from the doorway, Father Austin Hoodenpyle, the school’s chaplain, considered the workshop’s name.
“This parish places a high value on work and on a good work ethic,” the pastor said. “A class like this connects the spiritual good of the parish — the love of the faith; the love of St. Joseph — with that work ethic in the same way that Catholic education always does: combining the spiritual and the material world in which we live.”
As patron of families, fathers, and workers, St. Joseph holds a special place in the Muenster parish community, the priest said.
“The people in Muenster really began a devotion to St. Joseph to protect us, especially from bad weather, violent storms, things like that. For the last 100 years, we really haven’t had any destructive weather in town,” Fr. Hoodenpyle said. “So St. Joseph is important to the community as well as a model of what Christ allows us to do through His Incarnation, elevating work from being menial to something meaningful.”
COMMUNITY OF FAITH
At the heart of the St. Joseph Workshop program is Sacred Heart Principal Andrew Folsom.
When the Connecticut native arrived in Muenster — recruited by a former college roommate — he quickly recognized the need for a distinctive program that would set the Catholic school apart from its public counterpart.
A former history teacher, Folsom understood the value of trades, having worked as a welder and ironworker himself. In Muenster, a town of roughly 1,400, he saw a growing demand for skilled tradesmen and apprenticeships, even as nearly half the population were already farmers and tradesmen.
Folsom, now in his second year as principal, also noticed the gap that traditional schooling leaves for graduates who don’t pursue higher education and set into motion a plan for a community-driven project that would equip students with real-world skills.
Sacred Heart is “unique in terms of the sheer dedication of this one town to this one school, where 95 percent of our students are from Muenster,” Folsom said. “The school would not survive without the volunteers of this community.”
By God’s grace and with the “providential affirmation of what we’re doing,” including a generous donation of $25,000 to get the program off the ground,” Folsom was able to coordinate five tradesmen to volunteer and donate their time to teach the next generation of workers.
As one of those volunteers, Bartush responded immediately after receiving Folsom’s email to alumni about the project.
“‘This is exactly what I want to do,’" Bartush recalled thinking. "I reached out to him probably the same day it was sent."
“Our world is in a position where for every five, six plumbers we lose, we only gain one back,” Bartush explained.
Thanks to donations and community support, the program has had a promising start, Folsom said.
“Those examples are set through the alumni and people who do give back to the church and the school. We want the kids that go here to see that and be part of that.”
Looking ahead, he hopes to expand on the workshop by hiring a welder to teach students and by exploring the possibility of chartering a Future Farmers of America program. “We need to trust in the providence of God that He’s going to keep building this program,” Folsom said.
For now, students are doing their part to offset costs by selling some of their projects, including a rocket stove at the parish picnic. “Not only is it an opportunity to give back, but it’s also something that can help build our program a little bit more,” Folsom said.
SOULS AT WORK
Inspired by Plato, the program emphasizes the formation of the mind, body, and soul, Principal Folsom explained.
“The students come to life in that room,” he observed. “Along with their souls being formed here in Mass, we think that we’re going to create leaders in all areas of the country and not just in academics.”
Bartush agreed. As a Sacred Heart alumnus, he’s excited to help provide another path to consider.
“We want the kids to understand that we do want them to consider a higher education whenever they get out of high school,” Bartush said. “That’s always an option, but there’s also another option, and that’s the trades.”
A CONNECTION FORMED
“We signed up over the summer, and then they picked us to be in this class over the summer,” Sacred Heart senior Mario Ochoa told the North Texas Catholic as he inspects the work table. “They said a lot of people signed up, so I would say it was pretty hard to get in.”
Applicants were asked to reflect on the importance of joining the program. “We had to write a paper on why we think we should be in the class,” added junior Sawyer Huchton.
For Ochoa, the goal was to attain “more learning experience” and to consider a career in plumbing or becoming an electrician after high school.
As Huchton considers his own options, he values the community connection the class he’s already encountered.
“All the teachers are volunteers. They come after getting off work and come straight up here to help us out,” he said.
Many he’d recognized by name. “I’ve grown closer to them now that I’ve been in this class.”