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Hammering out a career

Paul Bickford
Northern News Services

Hay River (Mar 27/06) - Tim Borchuk never planned on being a teacher.

After years as a carpenter and construction manager in the South Slave, he filled in as a substitute trades instructor at Hay River’s Diamond Jenness secondary school (DJSS) in 1998.

NNSL Photo/graphic

Tim Borchuk is a trades instructor at Hay River’s Diamond Jenness secondary school. - Paul Bickford/NNSL photo


Although he figured he would substitute for only a few months, he discovered he enjoyed teaching and found it interesting every day.

“I never thought in my life I’d be a teacher,” he says. “It was a pleasant surprise.”

Borchuk has taught at DJSS ever since.

Borchuk, 47, believes his experience gives students insight into careers in the trades.

“I think I’ve come from the right background to show what a trade can do for you,” he says.

About the time he began substituting, the GNWT instituted vocational teaching certificates, and he was among the first to get one.

The certificates basically recognize career experience to allow people to teach.

Borchuk says his journeyman’s ticket in carpentry was an important accomplishment in his life.

“My interprovincial ticket was a key to open a whole lot of doors,” he says.

The Career Technology Studies program at DJSS has two journeyman trades people as instructors - Borchuk and John Ashcroft, a journeyman welder.

“I think the interest in trades is definitely increasing,” says Borchuk.

Each semester, about 100 boys and girls take the trades program at DJSS.

Borchuk estimates about 70 per cent of students who have gone through the program are now working in the trades such careers as carpentry, pipefitting, aircraft maintenance, welding, mechanics and more.

“One of our goals is to have an alumni wall,” he notes, explaining it would help keep track of where everyone is working.

Born and raised in Edmonton, Borchuk moved north in 1983 after finishing his apprenticeship.

“I came up looking for work and never left,” he says.

Borchuk first worked in Pine Point until 1986.

Then it was off to work for three years with the housing authority in Fort Smith, where he took advantage of the college to study computers and project management.

In 1989, he moved to Hay River to work for the NWT Housing Corporation as a project manager.

After several years, Borchuk decided it was time for a change. “I wasn’t ready to settle down into an office job.”

He and a business partner started a project management consulting firm, where he worked until switching to teaching. Borchuk says the North has offered many career opportunities, and provided a great family life for he and his wife, Donna, and their now grown children.

“Moving to the North was probably the best thing I’ve ever done in my life.”