Memories of shop class

I went to an all-boys public high school.

One of my favorite classes was shop. Tucked away in the basement my teacher was a guy in Carhartt overalls with a beard who I think eventually became a neurologist.

I remember using T-squares and mechanical pencils doing mechanical drawings in two dimensions and using my hands to build my capstone senior project, a brightly painted bird house that found its way hanging from the limbs of a tree behind my house.

I even had a slide rule. The plastic pocket protector was a bit much.

I remember the smell of saw dust and the soundtrack created by the whirring of the drill presses, routers, sanders and band saws.

There were no computers, CAD-CAM machines or 3-D printers.

My bird house was not exactly a robot that elementary school kids now make and compete in international competitions, but it had the same impact and I'm sure the robins were grateful for the affordable housing.

I was so motivated, that I thought my career objective would be architecture. I spent several summers after graduation working on a construction lot as a plumbing apprentice. The best I can do now is to remember to turn the water supply back on after changing the water filter to my kitchen faucet.

I don't do toilets or hot water boilers.

As things turned out, I wound up building and reconstructing patient faces instead of buildings. Given my experience you might think urology was in my future, but no.

In America’s most surprising cutting-edge classes, students pursue hands-on work with wood, metals and machinery, getting a jump on lucrative old-school careers.?

School districts around the U.S. are spending tens of millions of dollars to expand and revamp high-school shop classes for the 21st century. They are betting on the future of manual skills overlooked in the digital age, offering vocational-education classes that school officials say give students a broader view of career prospects with or without college.

With higher-education costs soaring and white-collar workers under threat by generative AI, the timing couldn’t be better.

Working with your hands can teach a wide range of valuable lessons, both practical and philosophical. Here are some key takeaways:

1. Patience and Persistence

• Lesson: Working with your hands often requires time and effort. Whether it’s building, crafting, or fixing something, it teaches you to be patient and that results often come through consistent effort.
• Why it matters: In today’s fast-paced world, this reminds us that quality work and lasting results take time.

2. Attention to Detail

• Lesson: Small imperfections can affect the end product, so paying attention to the little things is crucial. Whether it’s carpentry, gardening, or cooking, the more carefully you work, the better the results.
• Why it matters: It translates into other areas of life where precision and attention to detail are key, such as professional or personal tasks.

3. Problem-Solving and Adaptability

• Lesson: When working with your hands, you encounter unexpected problems (e.g., a broken tool, limited resources), which forces you to think on your feet and adapt to new challenges.
• Why it matters: This sharpens critical thinking and helps you become more resourceful, a skill valuable in both personal and professional settings.

4. Resilience and Handling Failure

• Lesson: Not every project turns out as planned. Mistakes and setbacks are common, but they teach resilience—the ability to recover and improve from failures.
• Why it matters: This mindset helps in overcoming obstacles in any area of life, making you less afraid to fail and more willing to learn from the experience.

5. The Value of Hard Work

• Lesson: Working with your hands often requires physical effort, which teaches the value of hard work and perseverance. There’s a deep sense of satisfaction in creating something tangible with your own effort.
• Why it matters: It fosters a sense of accomplishment and reminds you that success is often the result of dedication and hard work, not shortcuts.

6. Connection to the Physical World

• Lesson: Engaging with physical tasks helps reconnect you to the material world and the satisfaction of creating something with your own hands.
• Why it matters: It provides a break from the increasingly abstract and digital nature of modern work, promoting mindfulness and a sense of grounding.

7. Creativity and Innovation

• Lesson: Working with your hands opens the door to creativity, whether it’s through building, crafting, or designing. It forces you to think creatively to overcome challenges and produce something functional or beautiful.
• Why it matters: Creativity isn’t just limited to artistic pursuits; it’s a valuable skill in problem-solving and innovation in many fields.

8. The Importance of Planning and Organization

• Lesson: Effective planning and organization are crucial when working with your hands, especially when dealing with materials or tools. You learn to think ahead and make sure everything is in place before starting.
• Why it matters: This skill can carry over into work or personal projects, helping you execute them more efficiently and effectively.

9. Satisfaction of Tangible Results

• Lesson: One of the most rewarding aspects of working with your hands is seeing a tangible result for your effort. It’s not just about the process; it’s also about enjoying the physical manifestation of your work.
• Why it matters: This satisfaction can translate into a greater sense of purpose and fulfillment in life, as it shows how your time and energy can create something meaningful.

10. Self-Reliance and Confidence

• Lesson: The more you work with your hands, the more you become self-reliant. Whether fixing a broken appliance or building furniture, you gain the confidence to tackle challenges independently.
• Why it matters: It nurtures a sense of self-sufficiency and confidence that extends beyond physical tasks to other areas of life.

Knowledge is what you know. Skills are things you learn how to do. Abilities are your natural talents. Competencies are what you need to know how to do to accomplish a given goal. Meta-KSAs are the things that you know, learn and do that are transferable.

Entrepreneurial virtues v KSAs v competencies | LinkedIn

Other entrepreneurial meta-KSAs you will learn about are:

Failure

Selling things, including yourself

Stories

Fear

Emotions

Empathy

Pattern recognition

Testing and experimenting

Data generation and analysis

Resilience and perseverance

Mindset

Questioning

Decision making

Clinical judgment

Reinventing your business model

Resolving the conflicts between the ethics and culture of medicine and the ethics and culture of business

Working under conditions of volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity

Design thinking

Humility

Motivation

Unfortunately, the list does not include how to cook or load the dishwasher, and I doubt that putting "I built a birdhouse in shop class" on your LinkedIn profile or resume will get you that sick care data science job, but it might be a good conversation starter.

I'd suggest supplementing shop classes with "home economics" classes and beginning with an intro class on "All the things you will screw up trying to fix things by watching YouTube"

If nothing else, I think it would make marriages last longer.

Arlen Meyers, MD, MBA is the President and CEO of the Society of Physician Entrepreneurs on Substack