Students build skills and homes

MT. PLEASANT — As Mt. Pleasant High School students build skills for their futures, they also build homes which benefit their community.

Through the support of a continued partnership with McGwinder Inc., the Mt. Pleasant High School’s Building Trades class works to transform a once neglected corner lot once owned by the city into something the neighborhood can be proud of.

“On the lot that they're building right now, the city actually acquired that lot a couple of years ago through our code enforcement efforts,” Mt. Pleasant Building and Zoning Administrator Jack Swarm said. “There was a real junkie house on it. Real eye sore.”

“It was owned by a mortgage corporation that had foreclosed but was just completely fumbling and bumbling the foreclosure,” he said. “And they're out of Chicago and they really didn't know what they had here in Mt. Pleasant.”

“We were putting the legal pressure on and we wound up negotiating to buy that house from the mortgage corporation for $4,000,” Swarm said. “And it was a big lot.”

According to Swarm the city then tore down the home and split the property into two lots which they sold it to McGwinder Inc.

“One of the houses is occupied and sold now,” Swarm said. “Then the second house is under construction and will be done this spring.”

Last year, Lesa Fitzpatrick bought the first house on the lot.

Fitzpatrick made a home with her two children, who are now off to college, 13-year-old dog, Bella, and many projects.

While she works away in her home office, students build the home of her future neighbor.

During the second half of each school day, Mt. Pleasant High School’s Building Trades teacher Colby Newman and five senior boys work to complete a second home on a lot which once brought down neighborhood appeal.

They work on the property located between the Maple Leaf Athletic Complex and Mt. Pleasant Middle School every day for three class periods.

According to Newman each student took several prerequisite classes before they could join this senior-only hands-on class in which they build a whole home from the ground up in the span of a school year.

They began physically building this second home on the previously abandoned lot after a company laid the foundation in October.

“They did all the electrical, pretty well every bit of it, this year,” Newman said as he showed off the wiring. “We do have to hire an electrician who oversees it.”

“My favorite part was doing the electrical,” Jack Capps said. “I won’t have to hire someone else to do it in my own home later.”

According to Newman, the only electrical work the students didn’t do consisted of the meter work.

“That’s a high voltage,” Newman said. “We don't do the meter because it is too great of a risk for what the students can get out of it.”

The program also partners with a professional for student Jordan Dehny’s favorite part, plumbing.

“I never shoveled so much gravel in my life,” Dehny said of installing plumbing into the house.

According to Dehny, they use gravel as the make sure the pipes have the correct downfall.

“To fix the pipe has a downfall,” Dehny explained. “It has to have a downward slope so it runs towards the sewer.”

Dehny elaborated on the plumbing installation as he talked about the need for proper venting.

“The water also won't drain properly if you don't have the right flow or air pressure,” Dehny said.

Newman explained that it is a matter of needing a means for air to displace the water to create correct pressures and flow in a house’s plumbing.

As March wraps up, the 2022-2023 Building Trades class worked on hanging drywall and set their sights on finishing work in the not-too-distance future.

Just like the neighboring house, once this one is built, McGwinder Inc. will sell the property.

According to Newman, the Realtors involved with McGwinder get a head-start cushion for the first couple of weeks to sell the home before it goes on the open market.

“Normally we have multiple offers that first week,” Newman said. “They don't try and make a huge profit every year, but they do try and make a little bit of money to go towards next year to help the program be self-sufficient.”

According to the latest Building Trades homebuyer, Lesa Fitzpatrick, buying a home built by the high school students isn’t much different than buying any other home.

“There weren’t any appliances, and it was just a basic build,” she said. “There weren’t any extras like blinds.”

For, Fitzpatrick, however, the home is exactly what she needs.

“It is just the right size for me,” she said.

“So where one junkie house was, there's about to be two brand-new houses that the high school kids built and it's a really nice neighborhood transformation,” City Building and Zoning Administrator Jack Swarm said.

Comments: AnnaMarie.Ward@southeastiowaunion.com