The Foundations Are Set: Build The Cornerstones

The Savannah Technical College Center for Traditional Craft in partnership with the Preservation Trades Network and the International Network for Traditional Building, Architecture & Urbanism (INTBAU) USA, will host the 5th International Trades Education Symposium (ITES) May 14-16 2015 at Savannah Technical College in Savannah, Georgia USA.

The goal of this conference is to create an environment for collaborative exchanges between educational providers, institutions/organizations, government and industry and to permit educational providers to build greater partnerships with their peers. This conference is designed to build on the collaborative learning set forth during previous ITES events including Lincoln UK (2011), Leadville Colorado (2009), Tallberg, Sweden (2007) and St. Clairsville Ohio (2005).

The ITES “was designed to create opportunities for dialog and exploration of domestic and international models for building trades education and discussion of issues impacting the future of the building trades.” The ITES has succeeded in creating a forum for discussion of traditional trades education. However, a broader and much more pervasive need has become apparent. How do those attending the ITES, and the larger population working on issues of trade education, connect and work together as a community rather than in isolation to forge an interactive structure and have a more powerful impact on the future?

The ITES has shown there is a desire and need to come together to discuss trades education initiatives, but it is has also shown a much greater need; to create an infrastructure which will allow this to happen intuitively and more immediately rather than every two years or so. How can we establish a communications network which will allow people to access information about what is happening internationally without excessive amounts of research and development?

How can a network be developed which will show people what has and is happening in real time so that they can interconnect and interact? At the ITES in Savannah we would like to pose a question. Would your efforts be enhanced if you were able to connect with individuals, organizations, government entities, companies and funders by being networked to them? And ultimately, how do we achieve this?The foundations of this union are already in place. With modern technology and by building “Cornerstones” on the present foundations, we can form a new network and begin to define a new way to meet the challenges of building a sustainable, supportive and interconnected model for trade based education and heritage conservation for the 21st Century. Your input is crucial to reaching this goal.

Register now to attend the Symposium and join the dialog!

 

 

 

 

 

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