Posts Tagged ‘skilled trades’

Vocational training a good bet

November 28th, 2012
By: Vicki Bell

Among my job duties is scouring the Internet for news of interest to the metal fabricating community. Hardly a day goes by when I don’t run across items related to a topic of particular interest to metal fabricators—the shortage of skilled labor. It seems that every notable publication nationwide has addressed and continues to address the subject that cannot be resolved expediently enough for many manufacturers. So old, yet still timely news.

What’s relatively new in my searches—say in the last year or so—is the proliferation of news items from local media about expanded technical training programs in high schools, community colleges, and universities all across the country. I see these almost daily. It’s a far cry from what I was seeing almost a decade ago when these programs were being decimated. (more...)

Fabricating the American Dream

May 29th, 2012
By: Tim Heston

Many are rethinking the American Dream these days, especially over Memorial Day. The dream, however idealistic, is worth fighting for. But what is that dream, exactly? National Public Radio’s Ari Shapiro put it this way: “Though the phrase has different meanings to different people, it suggests an underlying belief that hard work pays off, and that the next generation will have a better life than the previous generation.”

He added that the notion is uniquely American. Although we don’t feel people are entitled to success, we feel that hard work and playing by the rules should lead us to something better than our parents had. Success, we feel, is within our control.

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The skilled worker’s pursuit of happiness

July 5th, 2011
By: Tim Heston

This week’s pomp, sparkle, and pyrotechnics celebrated, among other things, Jefferson’s inspirational sentence: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.”

The last of these unalienable rights may drive us more than anything else. But it may also be misinterpreted. We have the right to pursue happiness, but that doesn’t make happiness itself a right. We have to go after it. We have to work for it.
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