Recruiting students into the industry

By Emma Peterson. 

Learn how this roofing company partnered with a local trade school to help students learn about career opportunities in the roofing industry. 

Deer Park Roofing, from Cincinnati, Ohio, installs both residential and commercial roofing systems. They were established in the 1990s and have grown to encompass two offices and over one hundred employees today. Over the last few decades, they have collected a variety of achievements and certifications, including owning a United States Patent in the field of residential roof ventilation and getting Platinum Status in the Owens Corning preferred contractor program, showing their dedication to customer service and quality workmanship. In addition to this, Deer Park Roofing is also investing in the next generation of roofers. They facilitate the Deer Park Roofing University Training Center which helps existing members of the industry keep up on the best roofing practices and tools.  

Recently, Jessie Lung, who is the director of their human resources department, visited a career fair at the local trade school, Scarlet Oaks Career Campus. Four members of their field team, two from residential and two from commercial, came with her and taught students there. Jessie explained, “Our residential crew taught students how to shingle on a dormer, install flashing and run gutters using our gutter truck. The commercial team demonstrated how to heat weld and cut metal.”  

From that event alone, Deer Park Roofing brought seven students onto job sites to shadow roofers and learn about roofing as a career path. After that experience, four of the students, three 2024 graduates and one senior, joined one of Deer Park Roofing’s subcontractors, Jerame Patterson on a job. Jessie shared a few of the details, “It’s a $400,000 gutter job for the next six to eight weeks that will give these graduates and student on-the-job training from an extremely knowledgeable professional while simultaneously helping us meet our workforce needs.” 

Visit Deer Park Roofing’s website to learn more about how they’re investing in the industry.