http://www.forbes.com/sites/nichola...-vocational-training-in-schools/#5594d5dc465c

Forbes article on why we desperately need to bring back vocational education.

I've said in the past, I graduated from a vocational technical high school where my major was Radio-TV servicing. Yes, I did house calls those many years ago.

What say ye?

 

http://www.forbes.com/sites/nichola...-vocational-training-in-schools/#5594d5dc465c

Forbes article on why we desperately need to bring back vocational education.

I've said in the past, I graduated from a vocational technical high school where my major was Radio-TV servicing. Yes, I did house calls those many years ago.

What say ye?

I like the concept.
The problem is that there are not to many of those jobs left now days. The appliance repairman just left after looking at our washing machine. The little love dumpling ran an old throw rug thru it and the backing plugged it up. For a few dollars more we got a new one. Some people get computers fixed but they get better fast enough that it's tempting to buy new. Cars seem to last forever. Small appliances fill the junk yards. Not many cabinet makers. My neighbor does upholstery and some wrought iron for people in the hood, but he couldn't make a living at it.
Still better than spending 150k on a philosophy major.

 

Obviously, the lineup of skills in my old high school during my time have evolved over the decades. I stopped by there about a decade after graduation and they added avionics and their own airplane. While attending the school, the practical nurses and another nursing skillset whose students use to hit us up for practice dummies for them to draw blood. Then of course, the beauticians would cut your hair and the dental assistants would clean your teeth. Auto mechanics to fix your car, Auto body to get rid of the dings, carpenters, electricians, plumbers, graphic artists, and let's not forget culinary arts.

It was a good school.

Lots of skills were dropped.

There are skillsets today that can be taught in a vocational environment.

DOD drove the education initiative after WWII because of the technological explosion during that war. It gave us the standardize testing and the ASVAB.

on edit ...

http://delcastle.nccvt.k12.de.us/ has quite the lineup these days.

 

Obviously, the lineup of skills in my old high school during my time have evolved over the decades. I stopped by there about a decade after graduation and they added avionics and their own airplane. While attending the school, the practical nurses and another nursing skillset whose students use to hit us up for practice dummies for them to draw blood. Then of course, the beauticians would cut your hair and the dental assistants would clean your teeth. Auto mechanics to fix your car, Auto body to get rid of the dings, carpenters, electricians, plumbers, graphic artists, and let's not forget culinary arts.

It was a good school.

Lots of skills were dropped.

There are skillsets today that can be taught in a vocational environment.

DOD drove the education initiative after WWII because of the technological explosion during that war. It gave us the standardize testing and the ASVAB.

on edit ...

http://delcastle.nccvt.k12.de.us/ has quite the lineup these days.

Yep, some opportunities for sure. I had one kid take drafting. Turned out to be a whiz on CAD CAM. PCB layout might be another one .
Medical coders are in big supply now.

 

http://www.forbes.com/sites/nichola...-vocational-training-in-schools/#5594d5dc465c

Forbes article on why we desperately need to bring back vocational education.

I've said in the past, I graduated from a vocational technical high school where my major was Radio-TV servicing. Yes, I did house calls those many years ago.

What say ye?

Certifications are up, with a path driven degree at the end. I think Automotive would be ideal, considering many cars are becoming hybrids. Once an individual receives proper Mechanical training, maybe elevate them into electronics and programming if they show abilities or desire to do so.

kv

 

Apprenticeships also need to go up. My oldest grandson was lucky/smart enough to find a company to give him one for being an electrician, something he wanted to be since around 5 years old.

 

Apprenticeships also need to go up.

The business community is the driver in that arena. Of course the federal legislature's mission of "promoting the general welfare" could lend a hand. There are many who believe the minimum wage has a part to play as well.

This isn't new. Walter Williams addressed a plethora of issues in a documentary [Good Intentions] back when the minimum wage was about $4/hour.

 

The business community is the driver in that arena.

I don't know about the current time or how all states handle them, but when serving my apprenticeship my employer got a state "tax break" for giving an apprenticeship. So in effect the state government helped drive apprenticeships.

 

Bring back unpaid apprenticeships.

 

I teach (Electronics/Electricity) at a post secondary tech school, it was built in 1966 and has always been post secondary. We are now in the process of starting a dual enrollment program for high school seniors. We've hired an Industrial Recruiter to help by visiting ours, and all the surrounding counties high schools. I can usually place my graduates, that want to work, with little to no problems.

Some of the students are here simply because they get a check and don't have to do physical labor to get it. I have one now that his grandfather pays his way plus expenses (gas, food, hang around money) he's told other students " as long as grandpa is alive I'm going to school, when I'm done here I'll take another trade".

Then there's the student that sucks up every piece of information you have to offer him and wants more. We run the gamut of student types personality wise, from introverts, that do well technically but don't interview well to the loudmouths that know it all on the first day...
ITT going bust seems to have more people calling about info, although it's too soon to see if it'll affect our enrollment numbers..

 

Bring back unpaid apprenticeships.

When was that? Even in the colonial times indentured apprentices got clothing, housing and food. And left to become journeymen with a set of tools to fulfill there learned skill. If you mean slavery, shame on you.

 

Many contradictory ideas right now. Throw-away appliances and cars, air conditioning companies basically mortgaging your home back to you by charging $1500 for a 1/3 HP fan motor. So many government requirements that New Jersey has 48 occupational licenses and is passing legislation right now to license people who skim leaves out of your swimming pool. The good part? They aren't lying about their motives. New Jersey is not pretending to protect consumers from unscrupulous leaf skimmers, it's purely to jack up prices so the unscrupulous government can bleed the pool owners.

What good is knowing a trade when 1/2 your time and 2/3 of your income goes to obeying government regulations?
No wonder people want to sit in an air conditioned building and write apps and web pages. Risking injury and death in a physical profession doesn't make sense compared to operating a keyboard.

The world is changing, and I'm not keeping up.

 

Up to the early years of the 20th century in England, a young person (~15yrs of age) paid a fee to his employer for the privilege of becoming an indentured apprentice for a period of 5 years in order to learn a trade under a skilled tradesman, the employer had certain control over the apprentice, one was he had to obtain permission from the employer if he wished to get married for example, for this he Might have been awarded a weekly pittance.
At the end, the apprentice was awarded a Tradesman Certificate, provided he performed as expected.
This practice only virtually ceased as late as the '50's. but still, a decent apprenticeship scheme was in place, with one day a week at a technical collage.
And the result was a continuous source of very experienced tradesmen.
I shake my head a little at the current system here, our grandson is doing an apprenticeship to be an electrician, the system is controlled by the union which sends him here an there to work with any company needing help alongside a journeyman, but the work is sporadic and in the mean time he has to take menial jobs to tide him over between short spells of electrical work.
Hopefully in time he will have gained some degree of knowledge of the trade!.
Max.

 

In my case, I worked during the summer of my sophomore year doing television service calls. I changed jobs, then working every evening my junior and senior year doing maintenance and engineering a couple of radio talk shows and alot of remote broadcasts. I did about 30 or so hours per week. I was required to have a minimum of the Third Class FCC license with broadcast endorsement to engineer the shows.

During my senior year, the school year went like this, two weeks in school, two weeks at work. Since I was working all the time, it meant I could sleep in during my two weeks at work, since I worked evenings 6pm till signoff.

After graduations, I joined the military. After boot camp, my draft lottery number was 263, in the year they didn't expect to get past 12.

So, I'm an advocate of vocational schools. In some cases the earlier the better.

My younger cousin went to the the same school a couple of decades after I did. In his ninth grade year, they went through an intro course to four different skills. He worked since he was 12 at a catering service and by the time he went to school, he was cooking for that service. That lead him to the culinary arts program. He thought about going to Johnson and Wales in Rhode Island for college, but, choose a different path for his career.

 

College may not be for everyone, although in the past it was made easier for everyone.

I can't find the efficiency rate, or graduation rate for those getting grants.

 

Up to the early years of the 20th century in England, a young person (~15yrs of age) paid a fee to his employer for the privilege of becoming an indentured apprentice for a period

That is similar to how it worked in America during the early/colonial period but for one thing. The "employer" paid the boy's family instead of the boy paying the employer. Don't know when it changed tough.

 

I shake my head a little at the current system here, our grandson is doing an apprenticeship to be an electrician, the system is controlled by the union which sends him here an there to work with any company needing help alongside a journeyman, but the work is sporadic and in the mean time he has to take menial jobs to tide him over between short spells of electrical work.

I have a cousin that been apprenticing to be an electrician for a few years now. Like me he has the knack to learn that sort of stuff with ease which also means wasting time to get qualified based solely on hours not actual skills and knowledge gets to him.
Also, as with my experiences with having been around licensed electricians he finds the majority to be as arrogant and greedy as they are stupid too. Fortunately his employer is a small town business and ran fairly well but from the bigger jobs they have subcontracted into and worked with bigger city crews he's amazed that anything works or doesn't burn down when they are done.

 

http://www.forbes.com/sites/nichola...-vocational-training-in-schools/#5594d5dc465c

Forbes article on why we desperately need to bring back vocational education.

I've said in the past, I graduated from a vocational technical high school where my major was Radio-TV servicing. Yes, I did house calls those many years ago.

What say ye?

Excellent article, and gratified to know I am in the vocational school business.

 

Up to the early years of the 20th century in England, a young person (~15yrs of age) paid a fee to his employer for the privilege of becoming an indentured apprentice for a period of 5 years in order to learn a trade under a skilled tradesman,

If the person that you are training needs to pay you money to get taught. You ain't doing it right. Always make them do something that you know that they can do that is a part of the money flow and gradually move them on up.

Many of them will do that on their own. Coming for your position.

I've been a noob in many trades but never did I cost my mentor nor employer more money than I made for them... So pay me fair or I'm going elsewhere.

 

On of the most common issues with going into vocational work now is that so many people had parents who were blue collar workers that either told them not bother with it or they saw the less than optimal lifestyles that it provided for them growing up.
Up until the last generation or so the typical blue collar worker saw management as being above and thusly superior in education and everything else to them which today's generation knows full well that those people in those positions are no better, and in may case far worse people, than the ones they reside over.

I know for myself I have a very hard time taking orders from some overpaid half wit who has proven that he is not fit for his position and will straight faced lie to me like I cant tell hes doing it to cover up his mistakes or worse..
Or with the concept of working for a small fraction of what the customer gets billed for my time spent only to see the majority of that money be squandered over and over on stupid stuff that serves no gainful point toward the benefit of the company in any way either.
Then to add to that the fact that people in the vocational professions are the first ones in the company to be let go for any number of reasons especially ones where some office pinhead has to cover up a mistake they made.

It really makes me not want to work a vocational jobs any more either even if I do love the work. and enough to want to discourage others from doing vocational work as a lifelong profession as well.
You work long hard hours to get payed as little as possible, while making other ungrateful people rich ,while being lied to day in and day out by some half wit about how you're not worth what you get paid only to be eventually blamed for one of his many many costly mistakes and then fired for it.

Sorry but I suspect that that last generation isn't gullible enough to fall for that and call it honorable honest work any more. They can see what the generations before them got for it and know better.