May 12, 2011
Member of Local 146 Imparts His Trade Knowledge to Apprentices of Local 128
Harold Peter quickly offered his trade knowledge and instructional experience to boilermaker apprentices attending in-school training over 2700 kilometres away from his home local in Edmonton, Alberta, upon learning they had lost their instructor due to an injury. In early March, while running two concurrent eight week advanced boilermaker apprenticeship classes, Humber College instructor Ed Hoffman fell and suffered a broken leg. The required surgery and recovery time prevented the long time Boilermaker instructor from conducting his classes, which raised concerns that both classes may be cancelled. Jim Watson, Local 128 Business Manager/Secretary Treasurer and Scot McMahon, Local 128 Apprenticeship & Training Coordinator discussed various alternatives to cancelling classes with the Associate Dean of Humber College to avoid unnecessarily halting the apprentices' progress towards Journeymen status. Following those discussions, Grant Jacobs, the Director of National Training was contacted and in turn Jacobs took action, contacting multiple boilermaker technical training colleges across the country to request assistance in locating an experienced boilermaker instructor. Glen Gibson, Chair, Steel Construction and Hoisting Trades at Northern Alberta Institute of Technology consulted with his staff at NAIT, resulting in Harold Peter rising to the challenge. Within days of first hearing of the need Harold had travelled three provinces to the east and was leading classes for the Local 128 apprentices at Humber College. As a seasoned and well respected instructor, Harold understood the overwhelming amount of prep work which would be required outside of class hours to step into a program which had already commenced. In spite of this reality, Harold did not shy away from the call to help his fellow boilermakers. Beyond the formal lessons presented to the local 128 apprentices, the class will have undoubtedly learned an invaluable lesson from an instructor who was willing to go the extra mile (1684 miles to be exact) to serve our organization with his talents, knowledge, experience and time.
On behalf of the International Brotherhood of Boilermakers, Humber College, Local Lodge 128 and the attending third year apprentices, National Training would like to sincerely thank Brother Harold Peter for his selfless efforts and strong example.