California welding teacher Joshua O’Neal receives a 2026 Carhartt Metal Apple Award for his work introducing college students to careers within the expert trades. Picture: Carhartt
Joshua O’Neal didn’t even see it coming.
He was main a gaggle of welding college students in his Hemet, Calif., workshop, similar to some other day. The subsequent factor he knew, he was being offered with a nationwide award.
O’Neal, a profession and technical training welding teacher with Hemet Unified College District, is one among eight educators nationwide acknowledged with Carhartt’s 2026 Metal Apple Award for serving to college students pursue careers within the expert trades.
“This award is such an honor. I really feel very humbled,” O’Neal stated. “I had no thought I used to be even nominated, so getting recognition like this from friends who do not work straight with me is large.”
Introduced Oct. 27, the award features a $10,000 grant for his welding program and Carhartt workwear for him and his college students.
“Younger persons are within the expert trades, however curiosity solely turns into alternative when somebody helps present them the best way,” stated Todd Corley, chief individuals and affect officer at Carhartt. “That’s what these wonderful academics do on daily basis. They provide college students hands-on expertise, assist them construct confidence, and present them what a future within the trades can appear to be.”
For the previous two summers, O’Neal has additionally helped lead the Reimagined Rosies STEM Makers Camp at Alessandro Excessive College in Hemet, supported by SparkForce, the charitable basis of the Fabricators and Producers Affiliation.
SparkForce helps greater than 300 summer season manufacturing camps throughout the nation that introduce younger individuals to industrial careers by means of hands-on tasks, manufacturing facility visits, and interplay with business professionals. It supplies host organizations with grants, curriculum, and planning sources.
The inaugural two-week Hemet camp in 2025 drew greater than 40 college students. Contributors constructed metallic sculptures and a drawbridge, explored robotics and automation, and visited NASA’s Armstrong Flight Analysis Heart.
In 2026, the camp expanded to 4 weeks, and curiosity far exceeded expectations.
“We had a aim to enroll 50 college students this summer season; at one level, we solely had 19 on the sign-up sheet. I despatched some flares into the universe, and the following factor you recognize, we had over 360 candidates,” O’Neal stated.
Greater than 60 college students attended. O’Neal stated over 35 certified in a number of welding processes underneath the American Welding Society’s D1.1 structural welding and D1.3 sheet metallic codes. Campers took 5 subject journeys, and a number of other highschool contributors later entered his common welding program.
O’Neal has labored alongside Demi Knight Clark, founding father of Reimagined Rosies and head of operations at The Handheld Laser Institute, and Nate Bowman, a welding educator often called Weld Scientist, to deliver the camps to life. He credited SparkForce for making that collaboration doable regardless of the space between them.
“It has been so rad working with Demi and Nate on this camp. They bring about a lot vitality and pleasure,” O’Neal stated. “Due to the assist we get from SparkForce, this collaboration with them would in any other case be virtually not possible since we dwell so removed from one another. Our collab has been capable of break down boundaries and make these younger individuals need to be within the welding sport.”
Clark believes the trades want extra educators like O’Neal.
“Josh is likely one of the most humble individuals I do know, and I couldn’t be happier to name him a pal and colleague by means of the camps we’ve run collectively,” Clark stated.
“There couldn’t be anybody extra deserving of the Carhartt Metal Apple Award. He places his entire self into educating his college students and into ensuring they land nice jobs and futures (sure, typically in house). We want extra of that in our business.”
Demi Knight-Clark on The Fabricator Podcast
Demi Knight Clark joined The Fabricator Podcast to debate increasing profession pathways in welding and manufacturing. Impressed by her grandmother’s work as a Rosie the Riveter, Clark focuses on workforce growth, inclusive recruiting, and mentorship. She additionally discusses her mission to introduce welding to new audiences.
O’Neal brings greater than 20 years of expertise in development, industrial upkeep, mining, and heavy tools operations to his instruction. Now in his eighth 12 months of educating, he sees applications like Reimagined Rosies as a possibility to introduce extra college students to the trades.
O’Neal additionally credited native business supporters for serving to make the camps doable when college budgets depart little room for summer season actions.
“SparkForce’s assist is a large assist, as a result of annual budgets don’t precisely permit for these additional occasions as soon as college ends,” he stated.
With a bigger house and extra district and business assist into consideration for 2027, O’Neal hopes much more college students will get the chance. The keenness he witnessed over the previous two summers is an enormous motive why.
“Most of those children had no worry and have been very straightforward to instruct,” O’Neal stated. “It was as if that they had all the time been ready for this second to strive one thing wonderful however by no means obtained the prospect earlier than.”
Functions for 2027 SparkForce summer season manufacturing camp grants are open by means of Dec. 1. Study extra about internet hosting a camp and making use of for funding.
