Build It: Construction! 2020 Not As Planned

As event professionals, our job is to prepare for unpredictable circumstances, remembering that “things don’t always go as planned.” We crossed our fingers that the snowy weather would clear up the day before the Build It: Construction! 2020 showcase, but Michigan greeted us with another snow day. At 6 a.m., students and teachers were celebrating in their pjs, while we adjusted our expectations for the day.

For months, we had anticipated that we would host about 100 middle and high school students from Ferndale Public Schools, 5 teacher and guidance counselor group leaders, 15 volunteers, a handful of media personnel, and 5 local construction industry businesses at the Jam Handy in Detroit for Build It: Construction! on Thursday, February 27, 2020. When the snow day threw a wrench in our carefully ironed out plans, we had to come up with a different course of action.

The day before the event, the Jam Handy was ready to go - signs hung, name tags stuffed, construction vests steamed, volunteers and schools emailed, ball pit loaded, and DJ booth booming. Our small crew lifted, hammered, and typed out all the last minute details. When the day didn’t go as planned, we got right back up, brushed ourselves off, and started with a fresh mindset. Life doesn’t go as planned and neither do events! The silver lining: our hard work was not wasted. We took mental and physical pictures of the venue layout, boxed up all materials, and devoted the day to marketing, notifying participants of the postponement, and looking forward to making the event even better.

We took this opportunity to invite additional schools, including Ferndale Public Schools, Hazel Park Schools, and Oak Park Schools, students, volunteers, media, businesses, and sponsors to participate in the new, improved, and less snowy Build It: Construction! 2020. At Pathway X Events, our goal is to encourage students to learn about trade skills, career technical school, and apprenticeship programs so that businesses can impact students, and sponsors and volunteers can help us close the trade skills gap. If you or anyone you know is interested in being a part of this initiative, reach out to us at LetsDoThis@PathwayxEvents.org.

This article was written on March 11th, 2020, when there was national and state-wide uncertainty surrounding the international COVID-19 pandemic. As an event company, we are taking precautionary measures as we reschedule and host public events. It is our responsibility as event planners to consider all potential obstacles as we anticipate our event, including inclimate weather and diseases. We want to ensure that students, volunteers, and businesses are not only available to participate in person, but healthy and conscientious about CDC recommendations. Subsequently, the date of Build It: Construction 2020 is TBD. Stay tuned for additional details!