Mortenson launches new scholarship to draw students into construction industry

After the last lightning flashed across Minneapolis' skyline, two giant excavators resumed their work, crushing concrete pillars and chomping the remains of Abbott Northwestern Hospital's parking lot.

Henry Cacique marveled.

The 18-year-old, a son of a painter and Mexican immigrants, had never set foot on a construction site, let alone worked on one before.

But this was day one for Cacique, one of five Minnesota young adults selected by Mortenson Co. to join the construction company's inaugural Mortenson Scholars and management training program.

Under the pilot program, Cacique and the others each receive a $30,000 scholarship to study construction project management for two years at Dunwoody College of Technology.

They will work part time on Mortenson jobsites for $19.50 an hour during the school year. Each are assigned mentors and will receive extra management training. And if they complete the program, they are expected to be hired full time upon graduation.

If the program is successful, it could expand to Mortenson offices in 13 states. It appears to be the first of its kind in the multibillion-dollar construction industry, where the chance to enter management often evades people of color, women and those without financial means. The program's officials are currently recruiting applicants for a second scholars cohort in Minneapolis.

A lot of companies provide scholarships or internships, "but we don't see enough organizations that offer both to students who need it most," said Richard Harris, Mortenson's college recruiting head, who came up with the idea.

"For many of these students, it will be their first corporate-related opportunity," said Harris, a former Minnehaha Academy guidance counselor.

For Dan Johnson, CEO of Mortenson, which has revenue of nearly $5 billion, the program makes sense.

"We need folks," he said. "If we just recruit from one slice of the pie? As an industry, we're never going to meet the growth demands we have."

Until now, Cacique's only job has been painting houses for his dad during summers. "So, this opportunity is a really important one to my life," Cacique said. His parents could never have afforded Dunwoody.

"There have been hard times," he said. "There is always food, although sometimes we're behind in the rent, and bills as well. … But now, I'm really excited to start this new adventure and having a new way to start out as an adult."

Salaries for average construction workers can exceed $50,000 a year. Project managers often earn $70,000 to $150,000, according to recruiting and job boards.

Lynn Littlejohn, Mortenson's vice president of community empowerment , expects the scholars will become ambassadors for the industry and tell other low-income peers about this opportunity.

On a recent Friday, Cacique slogged through mud as he, market executive Mike Labukas, field engineer Jordan Schenck and project executive Sydney Wittmier conducted a site safety audit while work crews, forklifts and excavators whizzed by.

"Those machines are really cool," Cacique said.

Wittmier, Cacique's mentor, has been in construction for 15 years and hasn't lost her awe of it, she said. She's one of few Black women in project management.

When completed in 2026, a 10-story Allina building will rise from where this parking lot once stood. It will include 30 operating rooms, 200 patient beds and new skyways. It will also bring bragging rights as a formidable training ground for newbies such as Cacique and Da'Kwon Young, another 18-year-old entering the construction trades through the scholars program.

Classes at Dunwoody began in August, and both are the first in their families to attend college.

On-the-job training began in earnest this month, with Cacique running safety checks and Young learning how to estimate the cost of towering construction projects.

The immersive training is part of Mortenson's pledge to diversify the construction industry's largely male and largely white management.

Mortenson, which managed the U.S. Bank Stadium and Target Field projects, started a talent development committee in 2015, hired more summer interns and signed a diversity pledge.

Since George Floyd's murder 2020, Mortenson increased its recruiting and partnered with cultural and professional organizations and universities. That led to 238 new summer interns in 2023 and the hiring of 188 college graduates plus others who participated in a national architecture, construction and engineering training program.

Of Mortenson's 5,000 employees, 20% are now women and 33% are young people of color, up from 16% and 27% respectively in 2015. Last year, Mortenson awarded $962 million, or 19%, of its contracts to diverse subcontractors and trade partners.

This year, Mortenson partnered with Wallin Education Partners to mentor its new scholars and is chairing next week's national Construction Inclusion Week, where industry participation quadrupled to 5,000 contractors.

While there's progress, Mortenson "doesn't have it all figured out," Johnson said. Of its 245 top leaders, only 22 are people of color and 51 are women.

"We ask for patience," Johnson said. "We're working hard on it. You can see that in the pipeline of talent coming up" through the ranks.

But first come answers to basic questions in orientation sessions, like the one on a recent Monday where the students met with human resources, IT and other people explaining how the work site operate. It was not much different than any orientation for teenage workers.

Nope, no Crocs at work. Get some work boots; we'll help you with that. Show up on time. Be professional. "Can you take your gum out?"

The orientation "is all about getting them acclimated to Mortenson and understanding what the world of work looks like and how to do things at a company level," Harris said.

News of the scholarship, work and job training program was dropped on the scholars with much aplomb.

Cacique was pulled out of English class in May and given a party in the middle of Cristo Rey Jesuit High School.

Young started shaking when officials from Mortenson, Wallin Education Partners, school officials and a camera crew showed up at Robbinsdale Armstrong High School in June to deliver the news that he'd won the scholarship. He nearly collapsed when asked to make a speech.

"I was like, 'Oh, my god.' As soon as that happened. I realized that, yes, this could be a life-changer," Young said.

Mortenson's pay beats the $15 an hour he made during the one-year Lake Street Works training program for high school seniors or the $15.75 he earned cleaning and pushing carts for Cub Foods.

On Friday he learned that he'll be working each week inside the Mortenson headquarters building he and his mom drove by "a million times" but never knew what it was. Now, he'll train to become an estimator there.

"Being an estimator is like [directing] a scavenger hunt," Young said. He'll have to hunt for materials, figure out how much of each thing is needed and estimate costs.

"It'll be chill," he said. "I am excited."