IBEW Local 873 members weigh in on apprenticeship program

Mar. 26—Marcos Castorena comes from a family of electricians.

Eight in all have chosen the profession, including his late father Oscar.

And so when it came time for him to decide what he wanted to do with his own life, Castorena said there was little hesitation.

"I was just always surrounded by electricity and stuff like that," he said. "I used to watch my dad put together outlets and switches around the house or change the light and flip the switch. I'd think, 'Oh, that turned on. But when the power is off, that doesn't turn on.' So it was sort of like magic. My dad used to joke and call it wizardry. But when you grow up around it, you just get kind of interested in it."

These days, the 20-year-old is now charting his own path in the family business, thanks in large part to the IBEW Local 873 and its apprenticeship program.

Castorena is in his third year of the five-year program, and he noted the sky's the limit.

And that just shows the power of the apprentice program itself, Castorena and other members of IBEW Local 873 told the Tribune last week.

'A WEALTH OF KNOWLEDGE'

Mike Young, IBEW Local 873's business manager, smiled as he talked about the importance of the organization's apprenticeship program, which has been around in some fashion since about the time the national IBEW started in 1891.

Then in the 1990s, IBEW Local 873 teamed up with Ivy Tech Community College, which provides apprentices from North Central Indiana the ability to combine classroom work with on-the-job training, Young explained.

"We try to give our customers the best value for the dollar," he said. "These guys all have over 8,000 hours on the job minimum. And between the classroom hours (180) and those hours of training on site, they have more training than someone who earns a doctorate master's degree.

"So we like to say that our customers get a surgeon for a nurse's cost," Young added.

Brent Fye, who has been with IBEW Local 873 for the past 18 years, is currently the director of the apprenticeship program.

"There's not too many places where you can go and learn the things you need to learn and have zeros in your debt when you graduate," he said, when asked what makes the apprenticeship program unique.

Classes — Tuesday and Thursday nights from September through April — are completely paid for, Fye added, and the only out-of-pocket costs to the students are books and needed software.

Apprentices also get an associate's degree through Ivy Tech in the process, he noted, and their on-the-job training pays them 50% of a journeyman electrician's pay scale.

Throughout the five-year program, apprentices are also paired in the field with three separate contractors.

And it's that opportunity for on-the-job training that those interviewed said is probably one of the greatest benefits to the apprenticeship program, along with one of its biggest secrets to success.

"It's critical," Young said. "You have a guy out in the field who has a 30-year career. Now he takes a new first-year apprentice under his belt, and they work side-by-side. He now has that ability to take 30 years of experience, all the things he's learned, and hand them right over to this apprentice. It's a wealth of knowledge.

"And that apprentice gets to start off learning from all of the mistakes that this other guy might have made over time, all the pros and cons," Young added. "So that apprentice should then be theoretically miles ahead of where that other guy was when he actually started out. And then that apprentice gets to turn around and do the same thing with the next generation."

Brad Miller, who's been with IBEW Local 873 for six years and "topped out" (graduated from the apprenticeship program) in April 2023, agreed.

Miller works for J&J Electric now, but he said he's grateful for the opportunities the apprenticeship program's on-the-job training provided for him personally.

"The ratio of apprentices that we have, when they're out working in the field, they get to have hands-on-time doing things and working to gain that experience," he said. "If they have questions, they get with the journeyman (experienced electrician), and the journeyman helps explain it to them. They get to walk through it with them and can kind of take the pressure off."

That's another thing that makes IBEW's apprenticeship program unique, the men said.

Everyone in the organization has gone through it.

"We're almost a million members," Young said, "when you count all of us. And our international president, who sits at the helm of a million members, sat right there once in an apprenticeship program. Every single officer in our organization, from the training director to an executive board member, every single one across the board, has started off as a wide-eyed first-year apprentice."

And that's something they all said is worth celebrating.

FULFILLING A NEED

It was getting late in the interview with the Tribune when Young sat back in his seat.

A couple moments earlier, he had been asked about the importance of the IBEW, its place in society and why apprenticeship programs should still be embraced and celebrated.

"There's been electricity for over 100 years," he said. "And as long as there's been electricity, there's been a need for electricians. We are the ones that electrify the entire world. Imagine a world without electricity. As Martin Luther King Jr. once said, every job that performs a service to mankind has dignity.

"We have many members that would be capable of working in any professional field bar none," Young added, "but they find enjoyment and gratification working with their hands. It's not a lesser than profession. These are the jobs that make the world run."

Castorena agreed.

"When I was still deciding what I wanted to do in high school, my dad looked at me once and said no matter what, there's always somebody's that's going to need a light put in. Somebody's always going to need a light. Those robots that everybody's worried about, someone needs to install those. That's what we do. That makes us so valuable."

Castorena then took a few moments to offer some key advice to others, especially around his age, who might not know yet what field they want to work in for the long haul.

"If you're still unsure of your direction, join a trade," he said, "especially the IBEW. Five years is going to come and pass no matter what. So do you want to be an electrician and have a job in your back pocket, or do you not? You can join us and get paid for it and come out with no student debt for five years while you're still trying to figure out what you want to do.

"You can go to Ivy Tech, and whatever you want to work toward, you have this job that will help fund that," Castorena added. "You got something you can do. It gives you five extra years to decide what you want to do. Those years are going to come to pass no matter what. So what are you going to do with it?"