Conestoga College students Jeff Garraway and Michele Dunsford put on a piece of siding at St. John's Ambulance as part of a volunteer effort.

CAMBRIDGE — After 16 years in a mind-numbing, dead-end factory job, Tina Allerellie is ready for a new career.

She’s one of 15 Conestoga College construction trades students volunteering to fix up the St. John Ambulance, Cambridge branch, headquarters on Jaffray Street this week.

After watching Silcofab in Guelph close around her two years ago, she bounced job to job. Last fall, she jumped at the chance to take the women in skilled trades course at Conestoga College. It was a good decision, the Acton resident said, between drilling holes in boosting sections of steel siding on a brilliant late winter morning.

“This is really exciting. It gives us practical experience and it helps the community,” Allerellie said of donating her new skills.

For Matt Timukas, 22, the hands-on experience is a step on a career path that will likely end with an electrician’s ticket. A work site is different than book work, the Acton resident said.

“The main thing, I think, is being able to work together. You just can’t work on your own, doing your own thing.”

The first two weeks of March, a total of 59 students in the women’s’ skills program and the two-year renovation technician program are doing $133,000 worth of work for three non-profit agencies, said Doug Lockston, carpentry professor in the school or trades and apprenticeship.

Student work is observed by instructors and the experience leads into a final job site work placements before graduation in the spring.

This year, 35 community agencies applied for the free help from the Conestoga students and sponsors like the Mike Holmes Foundation, Swanson Home Hardware and United Rental.

After a shortlist is picked, executive directors from each agency visit Conestoga and offer students personal explanations of the work their agencies do. Then students pick charities getting the help.

“It depends on what pulls at their heartstrings, to chose the charity they wish to work for,” Lockston said.

Applications from non-profit agencies looking for help in 2011 are expected later this month. He invites inquiries at dlockston@conestogac.on.ca.

This is the third year for the volunteer “community build” by Conestoga students, Lockston said.

In 2008, students did $150,000 worth of work in Cambridge: at the food bank, Argus residence for young men and Lisaard House hospice. Last year, four organizations received similar value of work and materials: Conestoga students picked up hammers at the Waterloo Regional Food Bank, the Opportunities Centre, Parents for Community Living and PRIDE stables.

This year, St. John Ambulance gets a $33,000 gift of material and labour. A kilometre to the south at Simcoe House along Ainslie Street — the counselling centre beside The Bridges homeless shelter — $35,000 worth of interior renovation is underway. And at the Salvation Army’s Dream Centre on King Street in Kitchener, work inside the main meeting hall has a value of $65,000.

“This is fantastic. It’s true life experience,” said Michele Dunsford, while steadying a ladder outside St. John building. “It’s like trying it on for size. It fits very well.”

She was a police officer in Peel Region for 16 years before packing in that job. Now, at 51, she’s moved to Kitchener and looking at a career swinging hammers on construction sites.

Dunsford’s pink hard hat and pink safety boots stood out against yellow hats and brown boots worn by students working around her. She wears pink to honour all the people she’s known who have battled cancer. She was eager to help upgrade the home of a community agency like St. John Ambulance

“It’s a good feeling — a great feeling — making a difference,” Dunsford said.

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