A high school student approaches a construction exhibit, puts on safety glasses and reaches for a tool she has never used before.
Until that moment, “construction” may have meant a lane closure or a hard hat. She may not know that construction companies employ people in technology, finance, engineering, design and business development, not just the field.
Then she tries something. She wires a circuit, operates a piece of equipment, solves a problem with her hands and mind together. A professional beside her explains why it matters. An apprentice describes earning a paycheck while training. A business owner tells her he started in the field and eventually built a company.
In minutes, construction becomes visible, understandable and, most importantly, possible.
That is the power of hands-on career exploration, and it is why Frederick Construction Career Day matters.
On October 22, 2026, the Maryland Center for Construction Education & Innovation returns to Frederick Keys Stadium for the second Frederick-area Construction Career Day. In partnership with the City of Frederick’s Department of Economic Development, Frederick County Workforce Services, and IBEW Local 24, the event is expected to welcome more than 1,000 students from Frederick and Washington counties, more than double last year’s turnout of 500.
For Frederick’s business community, this is more than a chance to support a student event. It is a chance to shape how the next generation understands work and opportunity in this region.
Information Doesn’t Change Perception. Experience Does.
For years, employers have tried to fix workforce shortages by providing more information: brochures, job fairs, classroom visits. That information matters, but it rarely changes minds already formed by years of family experience, school conversations and what students see in their own communities.
By high school, many students already have a fixed picture of construction, and it is often incomplete. Some see it as one occupation instead of an industry with hundreds of roles. Others hear a false choice between college and construction, when the industry needs people at every education level.
A presentation challenges those assumptions intellectually. An experience challenges them personally. The student is no longer told “you could do this.” She has evidence: “I just did this.”
MCCEI’s Construction Career Day exit polling shows that students’ willingness to seriously consider a construction career increases by roughly 50 percent after a single day of direct exposure.
Why It Matters for Frederick
Frederick is growing, and every conversation about that growth eventually becomes a conversation about who will design, build and maintain what comes next. That workforce pipeline is not a list of applicants, it’s built over years through relationships and experience. By the time an employer has an open position, the pipeline either exists or it doesn’t.
The goal isn’t to persuade every student to enter construction. It’s to make sure no student rules out an entire industry based on a stereotype or a lack of exposure, and that the students who do belong in this industry can actually see themselves in it, including students who don’t yet see people who look like them in the room.
What Frederick’s Businesses Can Do
Bring the real work. A booth with brochures informs; an activity connects. Let students measure, wire, estimate or operate something themselves.
Bring people who can tell the whole story. The most compelling career story isn’t a job description, it’s an employee explaining how they got where they are: through an apprenticeship, a degree, a career change. Students need to hear the path, not just the title.
Make pathways concrete. Students often can’t tell an apprenticeship from an internship from a certification. Explain what someone can do in high school, right after graduation, and years into a career, without presenting college and apprenticeship as competing choices.
Give them a next step. Interest fades when there’s nowhere for it to go. A QR code, a site-tour signup or an internship application turns a five-minute conversation into an ongoing relationship.
Stay involved after October. One interaction can shift perception, but repeated ones build trust. Job shadows, classroom visits and internships throughout the year are what students actually remember.
An Event Is the Beginning
One day can spark interest, but it can’t carry all of workforce development on its own. Frederick’s real opportunity is to connect Construction Career Day to a fuller continuum, from middle school exposure through job shadows, internships and apprenticeships, so the event deepens an interest rather than introducing one for the first time.
That access has to be intentional. Some students already have the connections, transportation and family knowledge to turn one good day into a career path. Others don’t. Construction Career Day is free to students and teachers precisely so it doesn’t reproduce the inequities it’s meant to solve.
The Future Workforce Is Already Here
Frederick’s future workforce is sitting in classrooms right now, forming opinions about which careers are worth pursuing and which employers are worth working for, long before they’re old enough to apply for a job.
The business community can’t control every message students receive. It can decide to show up with a more complete one.
Bring the equipment, the technology and the employees whose stories can help a student imagine her own. Sponsor the event, exhibit, volunteer, mentor, or offer a site visit or internship.
Businesses interested in exhibiting, volunteering or sponsoring Frederick Construction Career Day can contact Jazmin Rodriguez at jrodriguez@mccei.org.
Do not wait until a position is open to begin building your workforce. Help a young person discover that the position exists.
On October 22, more than 1,000 students will come to Frederick Construction Career Day to experience an industry that shapes nearly every part of their lives. The question for the business community is whether we will be there to meet them.
Frederick Chamber Insights is a news outlet of the Frederick County Chamber of Commerce. For more information about membership, programs and initiatives, please visit our website.