I've been reading through this thread and I find it very interesting as I am an automotive instructor at a High school. I can't say much about the change in the students from 20 or 30 years ago to now, because I am only 26 myself(I'm only in my second year of teaching). But I do know that many of my students have no desire or motivation to do much of anything in my class. I can assure everyone that I spend plenty of time going over safety and tool usage. When half the class can't tell the difference between a 1/4, 3/8 and 1/2 ratchet by looking at it after being shown almost everyday for a week, you can't exactly get a lot of content taught that we are supposed to be teaching. My class becomes a dumping ground for students to be put in that are always in trouble in other classes or simply arent enough other classes or teachersto handle the number of students in our school, so they stick them in my class. We are a NATEF(affilliated with ASE) certified school, and that specifies that we only have a max of 16 students in our Auto 1 class. The administration put 26 in my auto 1 class this year. I've battled with them and got the numbers down to 22 but its still too many. Bear in mind that our shop only has 1 lift and room for 1 or 2 more cars on the floor. I've only been teaching 2 years and already I'm discouraged. My students have no motivation, I have too many students/not big enough of a shop, and to top it off I dont get payed anything. I can't even afford to rent a nice house, much less build one. Thats how I found this forum, searching for ways to build a cheap garage apartment myself. I could go to work in a dealership as a tech and make much more than I make now. If yall want to do something to improve vocational education, vote for politicians that support all education, not just vocational. By the way the Bush administration has tried to cut out the Carl D. Perkins act every year its been up for renewal, which is the act that provides all federal funding for vocational education. Any high school automotive program that is NATEF certified(most are) are required to have an advisory council that is made up of local industry members. If you are in the industry get involved, if not encourage industry members that you know to get involved. See if you can get your company to donate an old lift to a high school. Dealership owners and such that have money are able to put great pressure onto school administration to make improvements. I know its helping me get a fenced in area outside my shop for vehicle storage, I know its not much but it helps.
