Summer camp encourages careers in home building

Editor’s Note: This story is part of a summertime series featuring youth camps in Orange County.

Youngsters from Boys & Girls Clubs of Aliso Viejo and Capistrano Valley got a glimpse into the field of home design and building at the annual Junior Builder Program and Design Competition.

Organized by the Building Industry Association of Southern California, the two-day camp and competition featured five, four-person teams of students ages 9 to 14 who participated in virtual design labs.

To draw inspiration for their own designs, the youngsters were taken on tours of new Shea Homes in Rancho Mission Viejo.

For the culmination of the camp, the student teams presented their designs in the Canyon House Art Studio in Rancho Mission Viejo, in front of officials from the city of San Juan Capistrano and Orange County Fifth District Supervisor Katrina Foley, who all served as judges.

Awards were given in multiple categories, including most entertaining design, best collaboration and best overall design, which was given to the team of Jesse Flores, Alan Arellano and William Lucano of the Boys & Girls Club of Also Viejo.

The trio designed a single-story, three-bedroom home with three bathrooms, a garage and pool, while staying with the required $100,000 budget.

“We just let our imagination get loose,” Flores said. “We’re pretty proud.”

Launched six years ago by Jeff Montejano, CEO of the Building Industry Association of Southern California, and his daughters, Mia, 17, and Maddie, 16, the Junior Builder program mainly targets youngsters from underserved communities who might otherwise not be exposed to potential careers in homebuilding, Montejano said.

The CEO said his daughters were 11 and 9, respectively, when they came up with the idea for the build competition from creating their own home building designs using Roblox, an online gaming platform and game creation system.

“They actually took this program that they were playing at home and put it into a formal program,” Montejano said. “We’ve really put this in to educate these kids and show that there is a pathway, collegiate or non-collegiate pathway, in home building.”

The camp launched as a pilot program seven years ago in Orange County with children of homebuilders as participants, Mia Montejano said.

The camp and competition have evolved into several camps serving Orange, Los Angeles, San Bernardino, and Riverside counties.

“I actually came up with the idea for this camp because I was so interested in home building as a kid,” Mia Montejano said. “But there wasn’t really any camp for it.  So that’s why I really wanted to put all my time and effort in creating a camp for kids who really had an interest in home building or construction.”

The camp is held in a different location each year, this was the first time in Rancho Mission Viejo, a fast growing community in south Orange County. Currently, there are 5,000 homes in Rancho Mission Viejo, with thousands more being planned.

“We’re looking to provide career opportunities and to expose kids to the wonderful career opportunities that are in home building and in planning and in development,” said Mike Balsamo, senior vice president of government relations at Rancho Mission Viejo. “If kids get an interest in it, there’s a wide variety of options, but we really need support. We need more people to choose this career path.”