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Comment by StefanBatory | Hacker News Reader

How common it is to have shop classes in schools in USA?

For me in Poland, my high-school education was at liceum, i.e focus on academic subjects.

There are vocational schools, but they're known to be awful quality and you don't go there if you want to earn trade, but if you're an awful student. And if you aren't awful student, then you'll most likely end up as one - as your peers will most likely be :(

There are also "technikum" which is a mix of these two, but it's not for trade per se, and statistically chances you'll pass your end of school exams are smaller.

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The answer is probably, unhelpfully, "it depends". I attended a fairly large high school, and we probably had a dozen shop class offerings. A much smaller school just a few miles away had no infrastructure to support any shop classes.

It's probably even more nuanced than that, though. My parents both attended very small schools in small towns, and both offered shop classes. All four schools mentioned were / are located in the Midwest, though, and none in large cities.

If I had to guess, I'd say probably the majority of schools in the US offer some form of shop class(es). But I don't believe any would necessarily be part of the standard curriculum. Generally, these classes are elective.

I'll say something unrelated to my question before, but damn if I don't envy you for electives.

I had zero elective classes up through my entire pre-uni education. At my uni, I had one or two elective classes - at fifth and sixth semester, and that's all.

It is an aspect of American education I do like a lot.

(here we choose our profile, which assigns us to extended classes - i.e, Maths/English/Physics, Maths/Biology/Chemistry, Polish/Geography/History and so on, but then we don't get to choose anything after.)

Our area in San Diego, CA has different public high schools have a different offering that maybe all high schools would have had in the past. They are not vocational schools, but schools that offer specialized programs for you to use during your electives (2 of your 6-7 classes you take you get to choose yourself).

For example we have a high school with a culinary program, another with an auto program, another with a guitar building program, another with a music/theater arts program. These are all academic, public schools in the same district. You are assigned the school near* to your home, but you can petition for a different school.

*there is gerrymandering here too

> For me in Poland, my high-school education was at liceum, i.e focus on academic subjects. There are vocational schools

The US doesn't really differentiate between Lyceums/Gymnasiums, Vocational High Schools, and Technikum.

All tracks tend to be offered at the same school, but with students given the option to opt into vocational tracks.

Furthermore, a lot of skilled trades/"blue collar" (I hate that term) jobs have become increasingly specialized, so you anyhow have to attend a Community College or even a normal College to get the skills needed to land a job.

I went to law school with a guy who grew up in a state with "normal" highschools and "technical" schools for those not earmarked for higher education. Being a big football-type guy, he was directed to the latter. His mother fought to get him back into the "normal". Had she not done so, we would never have been classmates at law school. The technical school lacked the higher-level math and language courses that are important when applying to university.

Exactly the same here - after technikum you can go to uni... But statistically, your results for high school exam are going to be way lower. Or you simply won't pass.

I went to maybe slightly above average high school for my area and didn't have one. But there were programs where the school partnered with community colleges and students maintaining decent grades could attend classes elsewhere. And those had shop as well as other vocational programs.

They probably sent us home with a pamphlet with information at the beginning of the year, but I don't remember.

Larger high schools have them, in the Midwest US at least. College prep is pushed pretty heavily though, other tracks are looked down upon.

A tradesman I knew said find a career that doesn't destroy your body. Some tradesmen I've met say it's best to become an inspector or move into management.

My school dropped their shop classes about 20 years ago. Costs, potential liability, and a view that they were obsolete skills without value were cited as major reasons, but even for the last 10-20 years they did still have it it was 60% of the time just a class to throw kids into that didn't have the best grades and/or were bored of class work that they could be given an easy A in and push up those kid's grade point averages to try and secure more funding.

Very common, although many of the students don't take them (none of the girls as I recall). I took 'wood shop' in 8th grade, and there were shop classes (as well as 'auto shop') at my high school.

Even if Career Technical Education (CTE) classes are offered, there is a large variation in their quality. For me, the question would be whether a graduate from a CTE program is more likely to be hired and receives higher wages (initially) than a non-CTE program completer. My 2-minute Google Scholar search hasn't found anything on the topic.

At the end of the day, a 3-course sequence in a CTE pathway (which is the CA requirements for a high school CTE certificate in California) doesn't prepare you for a career in the same way as being in journalism class prepares you to be a journalist or being in theater prepares you to be an actor. Students will most likely need to pursue some form of post-secondary training (either through a community college or on-the-job) to become somewhat competent in their field.

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