Shop class

[Gardenarian]

I was just thinking back on my high school experience.
At my school, girls took Home Ec and boys took shop. In my sophomore year (1973) they decided to offer a shop class for girls (horribly called "Feminine Fix It!") and only I and one other girl signed up. Class cancelled. I've always been interested in building things and using tools and wonder how life would have been different if I could have taken shop for four years.

Did you learn a lot in shop? Do they still even have it in high schools?

[Polliwog]

I would love to find a "shop" class for adults. I would love to know how to use tools and make things.

Linda

[bae]

We had "home ec" and wood/metal shop and mechanical drafting in Jr. high.

I took several semesters of home ec, I learned a bit how to cook and sew and whatnot. Some of my less-evolved classmates mocked me for my choice, until I pointed out *they* were the ones stuck in a loud noisy place with other sweaty guys, while I was the only guy in room full of baked goods and girls...

[Float On]

Check with your area vo-tech through the school system. Ours offers evening classes in all sorts of topics - sewing, basket making, jewelry, photography, web design, welding, woodworking, fishing, cooking. The catalog for classes every semester also has an area where you can write in a class you'd like to take or would be interested in teaching. If enough interest is shown, they add classes.

[ToomuchStuff]

A lot of the shop classes are going away, due to the tools and the liability of them. With lawsuits due to things like the Sawstop and accidents like the one at Yale, schools are thinking it is too expensive to continue a lot of them. (class sizes are also an issue)

[Selah]

I took boring and stupid Home Ec in junior high: how to set a table, how to make a cake out of a box mix (!), how to wash dishes. Now that I'm an adult, I'd LOVE to take a good shop class and learn about carpentry, electricity, basic plumbing, tiling, plastering, hanging drywall, framing, window hanging, etc. Of course, all that would involve taking numerous and extensive courses, but even just a class about how to do basic home repairs would be great!

[goldensmom]

When I was in high school it was required that every girl took home ec. and every boy took shop. I was amazed at how many girls did not know how to cook, sew, etc. as my mother taught me all that when i was a young child. My father was a farmer/woodworker so he taught me how to use power tools, how to make a rabbit hutch, a dresser, etc.. and repairs mechanical and otherwise. Dad would do something to a tractor, tell me to find the problem and fix it or he would skew a woodworking project and tell me to 'true' it. I guess you could say I learned home ec/shop skills as an apprentice at home. The local high school dropped shop class when the shop teacher retired and they did not fill his position but they do have a new workout room and A/C which was non-existant when I was in school and required to wear a dress.

[Miss Cellane]

My junior high school, back in 1973-74, gave both boys and girls one semester each year of "unified arts." We did things like rug hook a top for a folding stool in home ec, and then cut and put together pieces of wood for the legs of the stool in shop class.

The other semester, you could choose what you wanted to do. I took one semester of sewing, which has come in very handy over the years (thanks to Mrs. Vose, a wonderful teacher!) and one semester of cooking, which taught me less than my mother had already done.

(I once made a dress from a Laura Ashley pattern. Went to a party and one woman kept looking at me oddly. A friend introduced us and she asked where I'd gotten the dress. She worked at a Laura Ashley store, and recognized the style of the dress, but not the fabric. She actually thought I was wearing a dress that hadn't hit the market yet and was wondering how I'd gotten my hands on it. So I'm assuming it didn't look all that much homemade.)

In other years at that school, my brothers made pillows in the shape of 3-D footballs, and the same folding stool and learned to cook.

My feeling is that everyone should get at least exposure to cooking and sewing and basic housework and basic tools and how to use them safely. My first college roommate couldn't sew on a button, or cook ramen noodles or hammer a nail to put a picture up. She didn't know how to use the washers and dryers in the dorm, for heaven's sake, or iron a shirt. I'm not really sure she knew how to make a bed.

[CathyA]

Funny you should bring this up. I had my car at the Honda service place yesterday. There's a service rep that I like to talk to. He was typing my info into his computer and was just using 2 fingers. I said "Looks like you didn't take typing in high school." He said "No, I took mechanics".

Then I proceeded to tell him that I spent a fair amount of my past careers as a typist. In high school, I dropped physics and Trig and took up typing. What the heck would I have done with physics and trig?? Anyhow.......we talked a bit about how girls HAD to take home ec and boys HAD to take shop back then. I did appreciate what I learned in Home Ec........but it would have been extremely helpful to have had shop too. I've had to teach myself alot of that stuff, and wish I had learned it earlier. And.........I wish guys had to take Home Ec too. There's no reason why girls and boys can't take both. Both of these classes would probably be more helpful to them, than, say, algebra, etc. Come to think about it, my son did have to take some Home Ec. I still have the pillowcase he made! haha

Some things that have changed over the years make me sad.........but letting males and females take similar courses is a good thing.

[Miss Cellane]

This is one of my favorite quotes:


A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects.(Robert Heinlein)

(Well, maybe not the "die gallantly" part, because in my perfect world, everyone would die of natural causes in their sleep.)

I know a fair amount of people with "learned helplessness," they don't even try to learn new skills.

Now, not everyone is going to be equally good at everything, but I'd like to see people at least try to learn something new and useful on occasion. Changing a tire is not a skill only men can learn, nor is cleaning coded into the DNA of women alone.

[goldensmom]

Changing a tire is not a skill only men can learn, nor is cleaning coded into the DNA of women alone.
I have heard more than one husband remark that he intentionally does things/housework wrong so his wife will not ask him to do it again. Not sure where or if that falls in male DNA. :)

[fidgiegirl]

In at least some schools, "shop" is morphing more into engineering and computer networking topics than woodworking and auto repair. Fab Labs (http://fab.cba.mit.edu/) are one example, though they are not yet common. My gut says that probably more programs are going away than anything. "College and career ready" tends to focus much more on academics than practical skills-based programming.

[Miss Cellane]

In at least some schools, "shop" is morphing more into engineering and computer networking topics than woodworking and auto repair. Fab Labs (http://fab.cba.mit.edu/) are one example, though they are not yet common. My gut says that probably more programs are going away than anything. "College and career ready" tends to focus much more on academics than practical skills-based programming.

I'm so torn about the push to send more kids to college.

On the one hand, I do think that everyone who truly wants a college education should have the opportunity to get one.

On the other hand, there are so many jobs out there that don't require a college degree. And there are a lot of jobs that at one time didn't require a degree that now do--in part, I think, because degrees are getting so common. A bunch of us were talking about this the other day--how, when we graduated college in the 1979s and 1980s, a bank teller only needed a high school diploma, while now they need the college degree.

We still need skilled tradespeople. When my toilet is flooding, I don't want to be able to discuss Shakespeare in depth with the plumber--I want the plumber to be able to fix the toilet, whether or not s/he knows Shakespeare.

This could be controversial, but I don't think everyone is cut out for college. When I was in grad school, I taught umpteen sections of Freshman English. There were a fair amount of kids who were there because their parents insisted on college, but who either didn't want to be there or had no clue how a college education could help them.

If a kid wants to learn car repair, I'd say let her. The world needs good mechanics. And plumbers. And carpenters.

One of my best friends is a hairdresser. She has worked her way up and now owns her own salon. She networks with other women in similar occupations--manicurists and the like. She lets craftswomen have space in her salon to display their jewelery and handmade tote bags and scarves. Basically, she's become a small business owner with a variety of income streams and, while she probably won't make millions of dollars, she owns her own house, and contributes to the support of her disabled mother.

She went to beauty school after graduating from high school. She has a relative who has a PhD. Said relative always introduces her as "my niece, the one who didn't go to college."

Which makes her sound like a loser, when really, she's been quite successful.

[oldhat]

I would love to take classes in car repair, carpentry, electrical wiring--just about anything hands-on. One of my regrets in life is that I've gotten to my present age knowing so little about how to do anything practical.

Problem is, I've searched in vain for local classes in any of these subjects. The local adult ed classes tend to offer either academic subjects (computer skills, foreign languages) or fluffy lifestyle classes. The local community college is no help--their courses are all in things like getting your real estate license or medical records coding.

[Gardenarian]

As a homeowner and a college professor, I agree that not everyone should go to college, and the world would be a better place for more smart plumbers, carpenters, electricians, hairdressers, and mechanics..

It used to be you could get these skills in vocational high schools, which I think have become extinct.

Oldhat - I have also had little luck in finding classes in for hands-on, practical skills.

[ApatheticNoMore]

Yea honestly I took more time taking classes needed to get into college than practical ones and of course the practical stuff is the stuff you actually remember and the stuff I wish I had learned. How stupid the system is, having you to learn useless stuff that almost noone remembers after they graduate anyway, instead of practical skills which often are remembered. And I've a fine brain for abstract garbage but really almost noone remembers what they learned of that when they were young.

[leslieann]

Trades are skills that can't be outsourced; plumbers, carpenters, HVAC specialists, electricians....we need people with those skills locally. I am so sorry that training for those sorts of careers sounds second best to so many. It takes a long time and much training to become a fully licensed plumber, carpenter, or electrician. I only learned all of this recently and regret deeply my former attitude. I would like to see a stronger focus to pointing students toward these careers....especially "smart kids" who can make a good business of a hands-on skill. In the meantime, I am sorry to hear that shop class is becoming less about shop and more about getting ready for engineering school.

[bae]

In 1987, I was earning about $32k/year as an Ivy-League educated software/hardware engineer.

In my spare time, I was rebuilding my '67 MGB at a local shop, run by a wonderful old British guy, who gave me a great deal on any tasks he had to do for me, walked me through tasks I could *almost* do myself, and helped me get parts and component rebuilding done.

After I'd been at it for about a year, he was showing me how to do Old School panel beating, mallets and swedges, leading, and all that. He offered me a job at the end of that, for $60k/year! I thought long and hard about that offer. Some days I think I should have taken it, the shop is still there and doing well, and he was clearly looking for a partner/someone to take over the business.

I think the trades are under-rated as careers by many. As soon as I got some of my HAZMAT certifications done last year, I got some pretty big unsolicited job offers rolling in from industries where this is needed, and I'm 50, typically unemployable in our economy as I understand things.