The students and instructors from the NWFA Inspector School, Sept. 29–Oct. 1.
When the students finished their inspector exam after the National Wood Flooring Association’s inspector school, VP of education and certification Brett Miller asked them how it went.
“Many said ‘Good,’ several said, ‘That was really hard,’ and some just shook their head,” Miller said. One student said it was more difficult than the firefighting and police training exams he’d taken previously.
It’s a good thing that the course, held Sept. 29–Oct. 1 at NWFA headquarters near St. Louis, was tough, Miller said. If it weren’t, the NWFACP Inspector certification wouldn’t mean anything, not to other professionals and not to the consumer.
The intense four-day class revolved around “real-world inspection scenarios,” Miller said. In fact, the instructors examined the same floor panels that the entry-level Principles of Wood Flooring school participants, many of them first-timers, had installed, sanded and finished earlier in September.
The biggest learning curve, according to Miller, is that, as inspectors, these students will ultimately make someone unhappy with what they write on their report, which “can be a difficult pill to swallow.”
The school was led by Cathy Duncan, EZ Report Writing; Brett Miller, National Wood Flooring Association; Tim Moore, Moore & Neville Inc. Flooring Inspections; and Jon Namba, Namba Services Inc.
The level of professionalism at the class did not let any participant down.
“Thank you for a great class this week,” said student David Zack of Detroit-based Flooring Inspections of Michigan. “You guys did a very nice job and the knowledge level of the instructors was superb.”
“It’s been a really great week for me and I am looking forward to doing more learning in the future,” said Roman Krzaczek of Annacis Island Delta, British Columbia-based Metropolitan Hardwood Floors Inc.
The students were Rudy Arredondo, Kustom Floors LLC; Carl Bahn, Horizon Forest Products; Steve Brattin, SVB Wood Floor Service; Scott Carpenter, Divine Hardwood Flooring Ltd.; James Colten, Woodwright Hardwood Floor Co. Inc.; Dmitry Lyubomirsky, Allstate Flooring; Michael Mehio, Floorsense/Expressive Flooring; Reuben Mitchell, Reuben Mitchell Fine Wood Floors; James “Bo” Morrison, Morrison's Custom Floors; Joel Negron, Metro Atlanta Floors; Robert “Rob” Remy, Consult Inspect Design Inc.; Jason Schuette, Finishing Touch Hardwood Floors; Barry Stout, Stout Hardwood Floor Co. Inc.; Paul Turner, Turner Floors; Tom Zagula, Loba-Wakol LLC; Kenneth Evanko, Evanko Hardwood Floors Inc.; Mark Freece, Mark on Wood Inc.; Roman Krzaczek, Metropolitan Hardwood Floors Inc.; Trevor Larsen, Brigham Young University; Edward “Chip” Lowman, John Shafer and Wes Vicars, Horizon Forest Products; Brian Prusik, Syracuse Commercial Floors;. Kelly Ragalie and Ovidiu “Ovi” Ragalie, Treadline Construction; Lavinia Rathbun, On The Level Floor Inspections; Bryan Readling, APA-The Engineered Wood Association; Robert “Bob” Walter, RW Flooring LLC; Mark Whatley, Amber Flooring Inc.; Paul Wimer, Horizon Forest Products; and David Zack, Flooring Inspections of Michigan.
Upcoming schools include a one-day Report Writing class taught by Duncan on Nov. 11 and an ICRI Concrete Moisture Testing Certification on Nov. 12–13.
For more information about the ICRI certification school, contact Ken Lozen, ICRI technical director, at (248) 848-3164 or via e-mail.
