LANE BEBEE – Wagoner
Like most football players, Wagoner’s Lane Bebee is hoping he’ll be a lineman somewhere in the college ranks when he graduatesnext spring. But if that doesn’t pan out, Lane is also working on a career opportunity at the Indian Capital Technology Center in Coweta where he is enrolled in the Plumbing program.
“I knew I wanted to be a blue-collar worker and work with my hands. I know people that do plumbing, and they make a good living. My great grandpa was a plumber, and my grandpa did it for a while, so I decided to give it a try and I like it a lot,” said Lane.
The course at ICTC is taught by Ronnie Jones who gave us an overview of the program.
“This is a two-year program and when they finish, they’ll have two years credit towards their journeyman’s license, so they’ll just need one more year in the field to be able to take their journeyman plumber’s test. They learn how to put all of the materials together correctly, water distribution, gas piping, black iron and steel threading and all the new technologies coming out like mega press and pro press, soldering, brazing and the broad range of fittings and piping that are constantly changing like the emergence of pex piping in the industry today.”
There’s also another aspect of the course that has posed one of the biggest challenges for Lane.
“Working with fractions has been a challenge for me,” said the big lineman. “A plumber has to know some math and be able to read and understand codes and blueprints.”
Despite that admission, Jones had high praise for Lane in his approach to the class.
“He’s a sharp and talented student who’s chomping at the bit to learn as much as can as fast as he can. It’s a skill he can use whether he’s a professional plumber or just in everyday home life.”
Lane sees an interesting correlation in the aspects of his football and plumbing worlds.
“In football, the linemen are the blue-collar workers on the football field just like a plumber is a blue-collar type of worker and in both you have to be good with your hands.”
