The Building Trades students at the Batavia CTE Center have completed a custom home on Ellicott street for homeowners Clint and Barb Worthington.
66 students were involved in the project which is the Building Trades Program’s 20th home. It is a one story structure with a walk out basement and is 2,200 square feet with 1 bedroom and 2.5 baths.
The Worthingtons started the process last May with Barb creating the floor plan.
After deciding to sell their Ellicott street home to their daughter, who has four children, the Worthingtons created the plan for their new home right next to their old home that was built in 1850.
“We love that we are close to the city and it is convenient to raise children here, you can invest your money wherever you want, but we decided to stick it out and be close to our daughter and our grandchildren,” says Clint.
“We are not the retiring type to sit around in a community center playing games, my wife is still working, she also paints, and I am certifiably retired, but I have many hobbies.”
In September, the original house the Building Trades Students were scheduled to work on had backed out of their project. So the Worthington’s home was next in line.
How the program works is the homeowner purchases the materials and the students build the home. “It’s a self funded program,” says Jared Radesi, Building and Trades Carpentry Teacher.
“We pay for the tools and bussing.”
The only things the students do not do is masonry, flooring and they don’t mud the drywall. In two shifts during the day, students are involved with heating, plumbing, electric, hanging drywall, customizing trim work and making cabinets.
In the Worthington’s home, they constructed an island for the kitchen, complete with electrical outlets, pantry cabinets and the cabinets around the fireplace area.
“We wanted to make our program more customized in that students are learning upscale training and skills that 2nd, 3rd or 4th year apprentices in the union are doing,” says Radesi.
Radesi, who is a 1992 graduate of the Building Trades Program, says the houses the program builds are up to date. “Any new products used in the industry we are right on top of it and we have the newest tools and most innovative things.”
The students are almost finished with their part of the project next month.
“I learned a lot,” says Jamil Marabel, an 11th grade student who has been working on the trim work inside the house.
“It’s been great and I’m coming back next year to do another house. It looks incredible and I am so happy for the homeowner that get to live in it.”
Clint says there is no move in date as of yet, he will be finishing the basement, that has radiant floor heating, painting and doing the flooring.
“It’s a unique situation, we have a great relationship with our daughter and it’s a beautiful lot with mature landscape on a rural lot with development and farm land all around us.”
