How to Build a Fence

I talked about how to find a work site in my last post. Our work projects is one of the main ways that we as staff use to teach Leadership principles. This also requires us to be able to train students in the skills that they need to complete the work projects. This is the reason that my Summit class took a week out of the fall to learn how to build a deck together (check it out HERE!)

However, there is not enough time in the office to teach us all construction skills that we might possibly need. Therefore there is some learning on the job. For last week's trip with Faith Bible Church (from Edmond, OK), one of our projects was building a privacy fence - a task I'd never done before. So my assistant leader explained each step to me as we bought the supplies, but it was going to be up to me to explain that to the students.

However, I'm of the honest opinion that experience is better than just head knowledge, so I polled the youth pastor and discovered that not only had he built a fence before, there were two students on the trip who had worked for a metal fencing company.

So in true LeaderTreks fashion, I passed off leadership of the project to the two students and stuck around as "foreman" to guard safety, excellence, and learn a little bit more about building a fence.

Here was our process.

Step One: Dig Hole

The students were very thankful for the Memphis  Dirt
A little softer to dig into.

Place post in hole, level and
pour in cement mix & water

Micah (l) and Anna (r) by the post they
completed on their own.

Matt is super excited about Step Two

The nailing up of stringers. Team work was important on this step
to make sure each stringer was level, and then hold the post to
minimize bouncing to make it easy to hammer the nail in.

After all the stringers are up, you put on the facing boards.
This is also a task where leveling is important.

It took the whole team to start the corner

Corner completed

We hit a snag or two closer to the end of this project, but ALL of the students responded fantastically when we had to pull out some boards to make sure the fence looked its best. Anna was so strong she broke a board in half.

Final Fence Team

So proud of you guys!
Thanks for teaching me how to build my first fence!!