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NEWS
2026 Midyear Meeting Registration is OPEN ↗

Wrapping Up Our Year And A Look Ahead

Words: Jeff B

It is amazing another year has gone by and what a year it has been. We have seen a lot of progress on so many fronts. All of this happens specifically due to the support of our members. Your support this past year is positioning our industry to make huge strides in the years to come. So what’s new?

AI Development
Wall Evaluator
The MCAA has finalized the development of our Wall Evaluator software. The Wall Evaluator software has been developed specifically to address the issue of what high schools have traditionally called career ready individuals versus what industry considers career ready individuals. The Wall Evaluator is an answer that will allow high schools to assess and grade students in masonry classes by what they can do with their hands (performance based) versus the knowledge they put on a piece of paper. Industry wants to know what a student can do in a field-like environment. At the end of May, the MCAA is doing a demo with the DOL workforce group to show them what we have developed and to work with them on how we would like to see it implemented at the high school level. We are hopeful to initiate at least three pilot programs around the country that would incorporate the Wall Evaluator into the teaching and assessing process.

Wall Bracing Program
The MCAA has finished the development of a Wall Bracing Program that will evaluate if a wall can be internally braced. If the wall can’t be internally braced, the program will then move the field folks over to the external bracing portion of the program and with a few quick answers to very easy questions, the program will show the field folks bracing points for their wall. Once the braces are installed, the field staff can take a picture of the bracing and upload it to the program and it will verify that the bracing is done correctly. We expect to begin the process of working with national OSHA before the end of June this year to 1. Evaluate and potentially embrace the concept of internally braced walls. 2. Evaluate and give their blessing to the Wall Bracing program. This would be a very large step forward in simplifying the Wall Bracing process.

Youth Outreach and Education
Our Youth Outreach and Education Program team is making nice progress on a lot of programs as well. One program that will be rolled out this summer is the Masonry Foundations for Educators program. This program will teach non-masonry construction education high school teachers how to teach a masonry program as a part of their bigger construction technology class. It will be the beginning of working with instructors to help make them well versed in teaching multiple trades and should expand stand-alone masonry programs as the program matures. We will be teaching it in a minimum of two locations this summer, although we expect to add more trainings based on initial interest and demand.

Educational Programming
The MCAA reinvigorated our Storm Shelter credential program in February of this year, teaching a class for contractors in the Dallas area. We are excited to see this program reinvigorated as we have big plans to push the resiliency of masonry throughout our new programs in the year to come.

In addition to the Storm Shelter Program, we have begun the process of gathering knowledge for our Generational Knowledge Project. We interviewed 6 different folks in an effort to begin to harness their much-admired work experience and wisdom. We will continue the harnessing of the knowledge as the new year continues to develop and look forward to making their knowledge and wisdom available to the younger generation in the future.

Advocating For You
The MCAA continues to have an aggressive advocacy program in Washington DC. This year, I have had the opportunity and privilege to be a member of the Presidential AI for Education Task Force. It brought me to the White House for a visit and meeting to discuss the status of AI and how it can be leveraged to further develop young people.
In addition, I had the opportunity to testify before Congress on AI on the jobsite and discuss how AI can impact the work environment in the very near future. I feel very fortunate to represent our industry and members at a high level.
While our trade is often considered older and slower to evolve, within construction we are at the forefront of the technology and developments that will help our industry shine as we move into the AI age.

In addition, the MCAA has been very active on two issues. The first is the Dignity Act. The Dignity Act is a bill that would address our immigration issue we currently have and is a compromise bill that would allow certain immigrants to stay in the US indefinitely if they meet certain conditions and follow a set of protocol to remain here and work with a legal status. We have been pushing hard on this for several sessions of Congress and are very excited on the chances that it may be the compromise bill as we move into 2027. It has been picking up steam, sponsors and endorsements as of the last few months and you may have heard about it in the news.

Lastly, we are working on a solution for the Heat Rule proposal that currently is being pushed. Our solution is very practical and we will have an opportunity likely in June of this year to present it to DOL. In case you could not guess, it does utilize AI as a potential solution to the rule. More on this in future newsletters as it develops further.

What Do We Have To Look Forward To?
We are very excited about continuing the development of our AI tools for contractors. You will see this continue to develop in the year ahead. I believe you will see some of these major AI developments this past year begin to become mainstream in 2027. We also feel that other trades will want to work with us to develop their AI programs at the high school level.

We expect our new Daily Digest to continue and expand the articles and variety in the year ahead. This has been an exciting addition to our content we bring to the industry. This AI-developed program searches the internet every morning and brings industry news to you from all over the world every day.

2026-2027 will bring likely one of the most significant changes the MCAA has seen in quite some time. We are currently finishing a small change to our office which will incorporate a professional video studio. This new studio will incorporate podcasts, educational videos, masonry industry related videos, general audience masonry promo videos and many others. It is the MCAA shifting the way we develop and give content to our audience. We will see a huge emphasis placed on getting short form video out to social media and begin to make a huge difference and drive audiences to utilize masonry.

We will also work to develop tools and resources to help educate our entire industry on shifts and changes to codes, best practices, etc. and make them available in short digestible video format that has become so common in today’s world. We believe it will be far more effective than simply publishing a tech note or paper on changes. The videos will cover and show examples of why the changes were made and show the best practice to accomplish different tasks.

Your support of the MCAA is critical to our continued success and development. We are very proud to not have had dues increase since the early 2000s. Our plan is to continue to offer new resources and tools to our members without dues increases. We are fortunate to have developed other ways to generate revenue to cover the increased costs of development and of course natural growth in membership helps. Our members are the foundation of our organization and are the driving force behind our efforts. Thank you in advance for your continued support. Here is to another great year!

Sincerely,

Jeff Buczkiewicz
MCAA
President


About: President's Message
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