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On the road to a new career Photo by Bob Pennell Doing some classroom time in the Rogue Community College truck driving school are, from left in foreground, Larry Balloy, James Davis, and Dave and Terri Campfield. The Campfields enrolled in truck-driving school after a September fire destroyed Boise Cascade's Medford mill. They hope to be trained, hired and on the highway by early next year. Former Boise Cascade workers enroll in truck-driving school By JONEL ALECCIA About this series: Terri and Dave Campfield are among families who lost jobs in the fire that destroyed Medford's Boise Cascade Corp. mill. The Mail Tribune is following three such families, chronicling their efforts to rebuild their lives. Stories will run occasionally during the next several months as workers look for new jobs, seek new training and cope with daily struggles. Three rows back in the hot, cramped classroom, Terri Campfield fans herself with a copy of the Oregon Commercial Motor Vehicles Manual and concentrates hard. At her elbow, husband Dave Campfield squints to study the image from an overhead projector: basic truck components, driveshaft to U-joint, engine to axle. The pair jot notes quickly as teacher Richard Burdick speaks, following the former trucker's every word as if their future depends upon it. Maybe that's because it does. The Campfields are two casualties of the Sept. 6 fire at Boise Cascade Corp.'s Medford plant, longtime mill workers who saw their livelihood extinguished with the flames. When the smoke cleared, the best option the Medford couple came up with was this: an eight-week long-haul trucking course taught by Rogue Community College and paid for by the Job Council. "I can't think of anything else where you get two months of schooling to make that kind of money," says Dave Campfield, who had heard team drivers could earn $60,000 to $80,000 a year. "There's not a lot in the valley." So Terri, 39, and Dave, 41, are among nearly two dozen students -- including several former Boise workers -- spending eight hours a day studying shift patterns, weight restrictions and the difference between spring and air suspensions. "Yesterday was the headache day with the air brakes," Terri Campfield says, midway through her first week. "There's so much to learn." The two are putting in classroom time now preparing for a state commercial drivers license exam. Come Nov. 30 they'll take their first turn in a truck; by the end of the year, they hope to be on the road to a new career. "It's something we've always talked about, even at Boise," says Terri Campfield, who met Dave when they worked together as spreaders. "We'd be there turning the sheets and saying `Let's think about team driving."' Back then, that was just idle talk, say the Campfields, who most recently worked Boise Cascade's graveyard shift. He was a spreader for six years; for five years she ran the raimen machine that inserts knots in wood. The couple say they never dreamed such a scenario could come true; they both still wish that it hadn't. "I don't want to have to make this decision right now. I don't like having to make this decision," Terri Campfield says. "We used to complain about going to work, but now we wish we could go in tonight." Boise Cascade was a good place to work, agree the Campfields, whose annual income totalled about $46,000. Besides the wages, company benefits were solid, paying $30,000 for treatment when Terri was diagnosed with cervical cancer last year. And the working environment was friendly and supportive. "It was a family," says Terri Campfield. "You just couldn't fathom the whole thing being gone like it was," adds her husband. As the reality dawned, the couple looked to their past for options. Dave Campfield had driven trucks before, back in 1979, after he was laid off from one of the mill jobs he'd held since high school. Terri Campfield's experience was limited to grinding the gears on her father's dump truck in Roseburg. "That was so many years ago," says Dave Campfield. "The first time, I drove down there in the truck and took the test, then drove home." It won't be that easy this time, says Burdick, a 22-year veteran of the road. Still, 98 percent of his students pass the trucking test on the first try, and nearly that number wind up with jobs before they're done with the course. There's a shortage of truck drivers estimated at between 350,000 and 500,000 nationwide. "If you have a couple that gets along pretty well, that takes time off while they're on the road, they'll do pretty well," says Burdick, who estimates that dedicated team drivers can earn between $87,000 and $116,000 a year. Good money and the chance to travel are both lures, the Campfields say. But the thought of logging 100,000 miles a year on the highway has its drawbacks, too. "One of my biggest concerns was taking a shower and the winter driving conditions," says Terri Campfield. "It's the tire chains," adds Dave Campfield. "I've got a feeling that will be my job." Still, the Campfields feel more fortunate than other former Boise Cascade workers. They've got no children at home now that Dave's two sons from his first marriage are grown. Wed just a year ago, they joke that they still get along well. And after Terri's cancer scare, the pair say they'll appreciate more than ever the chance to start a new future -- together. "It's good for us," says Dave Campfield. "We can just go." Mail Tribune Copyright � The Mail Tribune 1998, Medford, Oregon USA