Ed is a high school teacher,a shop teacher. He very much looked and acted how you would expect a shop teacher to. A big man, clearly confident and competent. Friendly, but you could see he was a no-nonsense kind of guy. He said he taught at a large school in Brooklyn (I think all high schools in Brooklyn are large). And he was a little concerned.
Competent as he is, computers have not figured large in his world. Email, research on the web, no problem. But CAD is good deal more complex, daunting perhaps if you are coming at it the first time. Computer Aided Design wasn't coming easily to Ed. His concern, though, was with what was coming next. He enrolled in the class because the Principal told him that he had to "Teach CAD or else," and that the shop classes would be greatly cut back in favor of more up-to-date computer based programs.
Eventually Ed could learn to teach CAD, he told me (though he sounded a little dubious). But if the shop classes are cut back he sees a real problem. He confirmed to me what I have seen myself as a manager. He had encountered many students who are not academically (or computer) oriented. He said he had been particularly happy to teach his students the intricacies of tools and work, about getting a job done. Many, he told me proudly, he had helped to get jobs, good jobs, in construction, at hardware stores or lumber yards.
These are jobs that we cannot "outsource to Asia", jobs that are valuable, jobs that many people would love to have.
As marvelous as Computer Aided Drafting is, any piece of computer software is not a substitute for hands on experience working with tools: building new and repairing old. In a more "green" economy, upgrades, installation and fix-and-repair is going to become a higher priority. Along with it the demand for people who can use tools to do that skilled and important work. Even folks who primarily do computer work will benefit from some exposure to the way real things really work.
We will all be well served to make exposure to vocational and industrial arts a part of every school curriculum.
I totally agree. If only CAD was taught at my college I would have had a head start in the industrial design or engineering industry. No such luck.
ReplyDeleteComputer aided drafting has in many ways made design easier and more efficient, but at the same time it has made us less careful. As an engineer, I often find I spend more time making little autocad changes to designs that we would have taken more seriously if drafted on paper or mylar. "Measure twice, cut once" doesn't seem to apply in the digital world. It's more like "measure once - cut, copy, paste as needed."
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