Habitat for Aviation’s Origin Story
An Idea Takes Shape
In the spring of 2022, Beth White emerged from a 10-month battle with breast cancer with an idea: to create an apprenticeship program at Franklin County State Airport where youth work alongside adults servicing conventional and electric aircraft and learn to become pilots.
Seeing Potential
Since 2019, every time Beth passed through the gate of Franklin County State Airport, she saw the endless potential of the 9600-square-foot warehouse that was slowly being converted into a glorified mouse hotel. 602 Airport Road, in Swanton, Vermont, had been on the market for three years and likely not sold because it was located just outside the aircraft movement area and with new FAA money to rebuild the runway, the Vermont Agency of Transportation was requiring all structures on airport property to directly serve aviation activities.
The building needed a vision, a total renovation into a hangar, and a taxilane to allow aircraft to access to the back of the building.
With family roots in the trades, Beth and her family were the right people to see the potential in the property — together they could fix and build just about anything. They purchased the warehouse in May 2022.
Within seven days after closing, a team of community members aged 7-78 jumped in and gutted the entire building.
Beth and youth aviator and future mechanic, Ian Bradette, grade 8, presented to the Highgate Select board who were overwhelmingly enthusiastic and supportive.
Taking Action
What followed was a flurry of grant writing, website design, an $10 million capital campaign to support the remodel and the taxilane engineering and construction. Friends from BETA Technologies helped us conceptualize the renovation – from a warehouse to a general and electric aviation hangar – with meeting spaces, a commercial kitchen that serves 30, and an avionics lab. In October 2022, Habitat for Aviation, a non-profit 501(c)3, was formed and our vision really started to take off.
Denis White Interior Contractors and White Ridge Construction donated workers to help with the demolition.
A boring company took core samples of the terrain along the proposed taxilane.
Beth’s mom, JoAn White led a group of elementary, middle school, and high school youth, including the White family grandchildren, Mason, Kaidin, Bryn, and Chenzy, who cleared brush from over two acres of what would be the future taxilane.
Beth’s cousin, Ryan Stowell, agreed to do the surveying and Jacobs Construction signed on to help with the engineering and permitting requirements set forth by the State of Vermont and the FAA. With support from our many Habitat for Aviation Champions, the taxilane construction will begin as soon as engineering and permitting is complete.
Beth White
A lifelong educator with over 20 years in the field, Beth’s expertise is in coaching schools to center learners in their educational pathways. Today, she intertwines her love of working with her hands and helping transform schools in Vermont in her work with Big Picture Learning. Founded over 25 years ago, Big Picture, a non-profit educational organization, is built on innovative educational principles that focus on learning both in and out of school.
Mentorship in a real-world setting offers students access to experienced professionals and therefore to deep learning and skill development in a field in which they are committed and passionate.
Six years ago, in partnership with the Harbor Freight Tools for Schools program, Big Picture developed the Harbor Freight Fellowship Initiative to elevate the respect and resources accorded to youth and their teachers in the skilled trades.
The program identifies students who display an active interest and a burgeoning aptitude in a trade and offers them a pathway to develop and pursue their interests in a real-world work setting.
Six years ago, in partnership with the Harbor Freight Tools for Schools program, Big Picture developed the Harbor Freight Fellowship Initiative to elevate the respect and resources accorded to youth and their teachers in the skilled trades.
The program identifies students who display an active interest and a burgeoning aptitude in a trade and offers them a pathway to develop and pursue their interests in a real-world work setting.
Using a Big Picture’s digital platform, B-Unbound, students find and are connected with opportunities alongside supportive adults in on-site internships. Habitat for Aviation will be a B-Unbound Hub for Franklin County, furthering B-Unbound’s mission to connect youth to supportive adults who share their interests and build a community of youth learning to navigate their way together.
Habitat for Aviation will join Harbor Freight Fellowship Initiative and Big Picture Learning to rescript the narrative around skilled trades and Centers for Technical Education as more than just a viable career pathway – we will be a proof point for learning through relationships, relevance, and practice.