Youth Apprentice Hayden

Inside of a manufacturing building with steel pipelines and cables.

Youth apprentice gains skills in manufacturing industry.

Hayden is a Belleville High School senior completing his manufacturing youth apprenticeship. His goals after high school are to continue working at Cate Machine & Welding Inc. in Belleville and attend Madison Area Technical College to earn an associate’s degree in automated manufacturing systems.

“In year one, I learned to use the CNC mill, set up and run parts. Over the summer I was mentored in Coordinate Measuring Machine operations, and am now the main programmer and qualifier keeping machines accurate to within 20 millionths of an inch,” Hayden said.

“The Youth Apprenticeship program offers students a huge advantage in the industry you choose because students will know if they really like a career pathway or not before they pursue it after high school,” he said.

Hayden’s mother, Rena, wholeheartedly believes in the YA program. She shared that Hayden has a greater sense of self-respect of the importance in the job and has learned to deal with adults on a work level. This has improved his ability to act professionally, take direction and implement that direction.

Hayden’s employer and mentor Steve Cate supports Youth Apprenticeship because it has allowed him to train someone from the ground up and have jobs completed to his specifications. He shared that Hayden is doing a great job in his second year as an apprentice, helping run the Quality Control department. Steve plans to bring Hayden on full-time after graduation in June.

Credit to Stuff SC

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