[HN Gopher] Shop Class 2.0: Rethinking High School to Accelerate...
___________________________________________________________________
Shop Class 2.0: Rethinking High School to Accelerate
Electrification
Author : jeiden
Score : 48 points
Date : 2023-07-11 15:15 UTC (7 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (volted.substack.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (volted.substack.com)
| fn-mote wrote:
| Just read the recent HN reponses to "The skilled trades haven't
| caught as a career choice [...]" [1]. Until an article addresses
| that, it's just wishful thinking.
|
| This article does address the push for all kids to college. Read
| comments at [2] as well.
|
| Very useful comments about the barriers to entry: [3].
|
| My own biggest concerns would be:
|
| 1. Popular anti-union perception: bad for recruitment, and bad
| once you're in.
|
| 2. Need to be in good financial shape by 40 so you don'
|
| I recently read a long thread explaining how hard it is to
| apprentice to an electrician, and how only the people at the top
| who own their own companies are really making good money. Too
| much work too dig it out.t ruin your body.
|
| [1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34262345 [2]:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34263317 [3]:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34273605
| ender341341 wrote:
| > 1. Popular anti-union perception: bad for recruitment, and
| bad once you're in.
|
| The doublethink I hear on unions is crazy.
|
| I have multiple family in the trades that are un-unioned and
| their statements are along the lines of:
|
| - They constantly bitch about how horrible unions are
|
| - Oh, {insert company here} workers voted to unionize? the
| unions just gonna fuck 'em over
|
| - All the people they started with who moved to unions are
| retired with well funded retirement funds and they really
| should have gone union when they were young.
| ecshafer wrote:
| New York State has this program called BOCES, which are
| cooperative job training high schools that students can
| optionally go to part time in their Junior / Senior year of high
| school. So you can go and learn welding, mechanics, electrical,
| construction, it networking, cooking, etc. The schools usually
| are targeting students who aren't college bound. But it is a
| great program which I know a lot of people who were able to get
| solid careers going right out of high school.
| photochemsyn wrote:
| Good idea - but practically, we'd have to raise the minimum wage
| to make these jobs attractive to young people, and a national
| infrastructure program would also be needed to provide the
| financing. Otherwise we'll just continue to slide towards a
| system of wealthy enclaves surrounded by miles of slums, and slum
| dwellers can't afford to pay for construction upgrades. Granted,
| wealthy enclave dwellers will be providing some jobs, but they'll
| probably be hiring contractors whose workforce consists of cheap
| immigrant labor, not recent graduates of American high schools.
|
| There are historical examples where electrification was
| accelerated, e.g. FDR New Deal programs like Rural
| Electrification and the WPA, but that would entail a complete
| restructuring of federal government priorities, increased taxes
| on the wealthy, redirection of military-industrial budgets to
| domestic infrastructure, etc. Seems unlikely in the current
| political climate, where oligarchs run both parties like sock
| puppets.
| ecshafer wrote:
| Electricians and HVAC don't make minimum wage. I know HVAC
| workers making $100k a year in a LCOL area, which is more than
| many people with degrees or master's degrees make. Many of
| these areas require certifications as well, so you can't just
| have any person do it (if you are doing it legally).
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| It is a question of the pay to qualify of life at work ratio
| and the volatility of it.
|
| Quality of life at work means things like having to travel,
| volatility of schedules, health risks from the work, quality
| of coworkers, etc.
|
| Volatility is are you getting paid a salary every 2 weeks, or
| are you exposed to more fluctuations in landing jobs, and
| dealing with customers who do not pay.
|
| Maybe the situation has finally turned a corner where an
| office/white collar job is no longer a no brainer.
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| Plumber in the midwest I use for some properties just let me
| know their new rate is $160/hour. My electrician is booked
| months out. I had to trench 24-30" deep and lay 4" schedule
| 40 non metallic conduit (PVC) ~120 feet myself to upgrade the
| service entrance at a new property.
| skullone wrote:
| I like your username. I too had to trench for new
| utilities, and remodel half my house myself because no
| trades are available in time for movein
| sybercecurity wrote:
| It's not the pay, it's the social status. As other commenters
| have noted, a skilled tradesman can make a competitive salary.
| However, ask most white-collar, college educated people if they
| want their children to go into the trades, I wager the majority
| will say "no" and believe they need to get a college degree and
| work in a profession (or simply an office job). In the US,
| there is a stereotype that only those unable to get into
| college work in trades as a consolation prize.
| lowkeyoptimist wrote:
| I think it might be more that a lot of people aren't willing
| to do manual labor if they have an alternative that pays as
| much or more. Even some contractors and electricians I have
| spoken to have steered their children away from trades not
| because of status, but that it can be really tough on your
| body and health.
| BluePen7 wrote:
| It's funny, in high school due to social perceptions I didn't
| align myself with the "shop kids", and took exclusively computer-
| based electives.
|
| It's led me to a lucrative career in programming, but now all my
| hobbiest time is actually spent learning the same hands-on skills
| I would have gotten in shop class, I love doing automotive
| repairs, I even learned how to fix my own AC system, and want to
| learn to weld.
|
| Electrical is the tricky one because it's the one with the most
| consequences for mistakes. I wish there was a "electrician lite"
| night school or something.
| bsder wrote:
| > Electrical is the tricky one because it's the one with the
| most consequences for mistakes.
|
| I disagree. Woodworking is _WAY_ more dangerous.
|
| I have had exactly _one_ mishap working with eletricity over
| the years. Somebody wired a piece of industrial equipment
| backwards (neutral as hot) and I got the shit shocked out of
| me.
|
| I have had quite a few near misses in woodworking even while
| being amazingly aware. I know of no old woodworker who has all
| of his fingertips.
|
| This video is about woodworking injuries gotten by YouTube
| streamers (CAUTION: Graphic!):
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xc-lIs8VNIc
|
| The one I never thought about was the final one (the table saw
| accident). It was a dual combination failure. He took an injury
| on his _right arm_ which drew all his attention which then
| caused an accident with his _left hand_.
|
| Yeah, I'm a big believer in safety equipment, even when it's
| inconvenient, after thinking about that one.
| rolph wrote:
| part of the shop class electrical curriculum, was the initial
| safety demonstration and hotdog buffet afterward.
|
| https://web.physics.ucsb.edu/~lecturedemonstrations/Composer...
| mock-possum wrote:
| Yeah I really regret not doing auto shop, wood shop, and metal
| shop in highschool.
| NotYourLawyer wrote:
| This is pretty common. If you sit at a desk typing all day, you
| get home and want to do something physical.
| sanderjd wrote:
| The grass is always greener: Lots of people who work with
| their hands envy us sitting at our climate controlled desks
| all day (doing god-knows-what).
|
| Although they do often tell me "oh I could never actually do
| that, I'd lose my mind". Which of course many of us do :)
| mason55 wrote:
| Grab some Arduinos, LEDs and buttons/switches and you'll learn
| about electricity pretty quickly with no real risk. It'll get
| you to a point where you should be comfortable enough working
| on mains electricity because you'll understand what's dangerous
| and what isn't.
|
| And if you're in the US and a healthy adult, you're probably
| not going to kill yourself if you take a zap at 120V/15A.
| mindslight wrote:
| Everything after " _Grab some Arduinos, LEDs and buttons
| /switches and you'll learn_" is terrible advice.
|
| Wiring mains circuits is about craftsmanship and the ability
| to repeatably follow technical rules for low probability
| events that were nevertheless "written in blood". Tinkering
| with electronic circuits is not going to get you the
| engineering rigor you need to come at mains circuits from
| first principles.
|
| You certainly can learn DIY house wiring safely as its own
| thing! The point is that they are just completely different
| skillsets, and you shouldn't be extrapolating confidence from
| low voltage circuits into mains wiring.
|
| Also no, while 170 volt mains voltage (US residential peak
| voltage) is not likely to "kill" you, the actual risks are
| things like house fires from short circuits and intermittent
| connections. If you're doing anything where you're worried
| about getting "zapped", you're doing things horribly wrong in
| the first place.
| mech987987 wrote:
| I disagree regarding how much overlap there is between low
| voltage skill sets and high voltage skill sets. Even though
| the consequences are different, understanding when the
| circuit is energized and not is important, understanding
| the path of current flow is important, and lots of other
| concepts intuitively overlap.
|
| For most household wiring tasks, turning off the circuit at
| the breaker box is the main safety provision. Using a wire
| nut properly is a bit tricky but not the worst thing in the
| world, and I don't trust a rushed contractor to tighten a
| wire nut any better than myself.
| mindslight wrote:
| There is overlap for design/analysis. The problem is that
| overlap is insufficient to do mains wiring _safely_.
| Engineers doing their own work is an inspector cliche for
| a reason.
|
| > _Using a wire nut properly is a bit tricky but not the
| worst thing in the world, and I don 't trust a rushed
| contractor to tighten a wire nut any better than myself._
|
| This ties right into my point though. Low power circuits
| generally don't use wire nuts, and even when they might,
| they don't use thicker solid wires generally used for
| mains wiring. So you most likely learned wire nuts as
| their own separate skill, rather than from low voltage
| circuit work. My point is you've got to learn all those
| mains details in their own right, rather than thinking
| it's just like low voltage/power wiring.
|
| (I totally agree about trusting yourself versus a rushed
| contractor! Emphatically yes - please do learn to DIY! My
| point is about the learning path to get there)
| majjam wrote:
| You might find this HN discussion interesting, its full of good
| explanations for different electrical concepts:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26362492
| munificent wrote:
| My pandemic hobby was dabbling in electronics building
| synthesizer modules.
|
| You can learn a whole lot about electricity by working on small
| low voltage projects like that without any risk of harm to
| yourself.
| browningstreet wrote:
| Both, he tried to tell us...
|
| Brian: I'm a **in' idiot because I can't make a lamp?
|
| Bender: No, you're a genius because you can't make a lamp.
|
| Brian: What do you know about Trigonometry?
|
| Bender: I could care less about Trigonometry.
|
| Brian: Bender, did you know without Trigonometry there'd be no
| engineering?
|
| Bender: Without lamps, there'd be no light.
| cmollis wrote:
| Breakfast club. Good flick
| jeiden wrote:
| We'll be short 1M electricians by 2020. Bringing vocational
| training back into high schools will help us ditch fossil fuels,
| bridge the skilled workforce gap, and empower more young people
| to succeed.
| pirocks wrote:
| 1 million electricians strikes me as a lot of electricians.
| Also it already is 2020. Typo perhaps? Source?
| vkou wrote:
| So, when will wage growth cover that 1M gap? It's 2023,
| already...
| passwordoops wrote:
| Cool this guy has a time machine!! When you get back, put all
| your money in GME, but sell everything on January 17, 2021
| cptcobalt wrote:
| I work in renewable energy, and have started to get my hands on
| electrical work here and there--this is a _serious_ space of
| opportunity for people starting their careers.
|
| Not every job needs to be (nor can be) a desk job, and with the
| advent of AI tools, you'll still have many hands-one roles in the
| field. Much of the difficulty of getting solar and home battery
| storage (like Powerwall) is because there is such a shortage of
| electricians.
| sanderjd wrote:
| Something that really frustrates me is that modern society
| doesn't seem to provide many opportunities for balance when it
| comes to work. I don't think I'd enjoy (and can't currently
| afford to) be a full time electrician. But I think some mix of
| doing professional electrical work and building software sounds
| pretty great. But expertise is critical and it's hard to build
| it by splitting time.
| cinntaile wrote:
| Installing solar och batteries yourself is not legal in most
| places I presume. It's not here at least.
| reportingsjr wrote:
| Not true in most of the US, you do need to get engineered
| drawings, permits, etc which can be challenging for the
| average person.
| triyambakam wrote:
| Where is here for you? Sweden?
| teeray wrote:
| "Shop Class as Soulcraft" has a line that stuck in my memory:
| "You can't hammer nails over the Internet."
|
| Also, before the pedants go finding nail hammering robots, it's
| a simplification to make the point that there will always be
| room for the trades in the real world.
| imtringued wrote:
| Why bother? Western countries doubled down on climate change as
| their immigration policy. There won't be a labor shortage in the
| future. The only shortage will be the number of guardsmen
| patrolling the border and the problem with those is that they
| need to be loyal and swiftly execute "permanent" orders or else
| their backlog will grow like that of a college student who
| constantly has to correct his homework and resubmit it.
| marpstar wrote:
| It's such an obvious problem. It's hard enough to get an
| electrician to come check your place for a basic job -- how do we
| expect to even simply build enough charging stations so that the
| average consumer doesn't need to _think_ about taking a 500mi
| trip?
|
| I wonder if the average person thinks that something like a Tesla
| charging station is something that's manufactured somewhere far
| away from them and just plugged in to a the nearest power line.
| "We have electricity everywhere so it's just a matter of time"
| mentality.
|
| We drove kids to college under the guise of "you'll be fucked if
| you don't" while simultaneously sounding the alarm on climate
| change but didn't think to try and connect the two problems to
| anticipate the solution 30 years ago?
___________________________________________________________________
(page generated 2023-07-11 23:02 UTC)