[Music]
[Applause]
[Music]
[Applause]
[Music]
you know my first hero my first role
model was my dad Jim he was a mechanic
he had this command of the physical
world around us that just amazed me he
could make these complex mechanisms and
machines interact with each other and
behave in ways that just blew my mind
I remember watching him amazed as his
fingers would would dance over an engine
as though you were conducting an
orchestra
I was surprised though I was perplexed
by the way that the adults around me
acted towards my dad and the way that
they reacted when they were told that he
was a mechanic didn’t they understand
what that was that that he was the one
that they could call when the most
complex machine that they owned was
broken and left them stranded knowing
full well that it would be in good hands
with him because he was an expert at
diagnosing and repairing every single
little system within that complex
machine he was the one that they would
pay happily at the same rate as their
therapist as their lawyers their doctor
and put no less the same faith in his
skills and in his expertise yet for some
reason that I couldn’t understand his
skills his expertise they just were not
held in a high place of esteem or regard
I began thinking that there must be
something inherently inferior about
being a mechanic that being a mechanic
must be something that that people would
do when good clean desirable jobs were
outside of their reach I decided that
for myself I I wanted something more
than that
I started ranking the adults around me
by the clothes that they wore to work or
or the way that they were addressed by
their peers the letters after their name
MD esq MD
our NBA all the way down to my dad Jim
he didn’t even get a mr. just simply Jim
entering high school I was introduced to
the wonderful world of shop class by our
teacher Phil LEM cow and he blew my mind
every single day he connected the the
chemistry the physics the mathematics
that we were learning in the classroom
almost the physical world around us he
taught me and taught anyone willing to
listen just how much the world counted
on those that understood the way that
that an electron flowed through a wire
or even just how a toilet flushed
I was surprised though again because the
school was just so nonchalant about what
it was that he was teaching us I I don’t
mean to imply that that what we gained
from the 5060 hours that we spent on The
Scarlet Letter was somehow not important
but but this guy over here he was
letting out all the secrets to how the
world worked and no one was paying any
attention it wasn’t just in my little
school either all across the country
shop classes like his were were being
shuttered and forgotten retired with
retiring shop teachers the only real
introduction to a career in the skilled
trades had been removed from the
curriculum through our words and through
our actions as well we have been
teaching our children that careers in
the skilled trades are to be settled for
when all else fails them rather than
strived for you know I have a
two-year-old son myself now his name’s
David and before too long he’s going to
be looking to me for guidance about what
to do was the productive part of his
life and his path and I want to make
sure that what I pass on to him tells
the whole story careers in the skilled
trades are not just dirty stinky nasty
jobs that nobody really wants but that
somebody has to do sure the the plumber
that you called to fix your sink may
show up with a little mud on his shoes
or he may get some water on the sleeve
of his shirt as he’s working but with an
average income up over fifty five
thousand dollars a year that plumber is
making the same as the average college
graduate have you seen the inside of
modern American manufacturing facilities
they have more in common with well-lit
laboratories than they do the
post-industrial revolution workhouse in
your mind’s eye the manufacturing sector
right now today has millions of open
physicians just waiting for the right
candidates with the right skills and the
right training to walk through their
doors I’m not trying to tell you that I
think that colleges are bad in fact some
of my best friends are college graduates
a four-year degree is a prerequisite for
some wonderful and some rewarding
careers and it’s exactly the right
choice to make for about a third of
those that under college but out of ten
students entering college this year only
three of them will both graduate and
take a position that requires the degree
that they have earned a full five of
those half of those students will feel
the shame and the embarrassment of
dropping out and find themselves making
an average of five thousand dollars a
year less per year than their high
school classmates that never entered
college the last two of those ten will
graduate and then be unable to find a
career using that degree that they have
worked so hard and taken on so much debt
to earn we have created an educational
system wherein the high schools are
graduating students that are largely
unprepared to enter the skilled trades
and that treats those in the career-tech
and vocational programs as second-class
students that are unable to hack it
academically in the real schools we are
shoveling our high school graduates into
colleges telling them to feel around and
and to grab a hold of something that
they connect with or feel a passion for
and and take on just whatever debt is
necessary to get through that program we
are leading our children to believe that
if they apply themselves if they really
work hard they will be able to find a
wonderful and rewarding career doing
whatever it is that they choose to do
unfortunately the workplace doesn’t look
at a list of of how many history majors
are graduating this year and then create
that number of historian jobs the
workplace is crying out to us for
skilled workers to build to maintain to
manufacture our world I think that it’s
important that we start listening to
them
I think that it’s time that we start
encouraging our friends and our children
to pursue those careers in the skilled
trades rather than settling for them we
must change the way that we think and
the way that we teach our children to
think about preparing for a career we
must teach them that a career in the
skilled trades is clean is wonderful is
rewarding is well-paying is stable and
is not beneath their station we must
push our schools to bring back those
shop classes and to begin treating and
teaching those skills with the same
esteem the same reverence that they
garner in the workplace we need to
identify those corrosive stereotypes
those well-meaning prejudices within
ourselves and begin supporting our
children when they come to us and say
when I grow up I want to be a mechanic
thank you
[Applause]
[Music]
[Applause]
[Music]
[Applause]
[Music]
you know my first hero my first role
model was my dad Jim he was a mechanic
he had this command of the physical
world around us that just amazed me he
could make these complex mechanisms and
machines interact with each other and
behave in ways that just blew my mind
I remember watching him amazed as his
fingers would would dance over an engine
as though you were conducting an
orchestra
I was surprised though I was perplexed
by the way that the adults around me
acted towards my dad and the way that
they reacted when they were told that he
was a mechanic didn’t they understand
what that was that that he was the one
that they could call when the most
complex machine that they owned was
broken and left them stranded knowing
full well that it would be in good hands
with him because he was an expert at
diagnosing and repairing every single
little system within that complex
machine he was the one that they would
pay happily at the same rate as their
therapist as their lawyers their doctor
and put no less the same faith in his
skills and in his expertise yet for some
reason that I couldn’t understand his
skills his expertise they just were not
held in a high place of esteem or regard
I began thinking that there must be
something inherently inferior about
being a mechanic that being a mechanic
must be something that that people would
do when good clean desirable jobs were
outside of their reach I decided that
for myself I I wanted something more
than that
I started ranking the adults around me
by the clothes that they wore to work or
or the way that they were addressed by
their peers the letters after their name
MD esq MD
our NBA all the way down to my dad Jim
he didn’t even get a mr. just simply Jim
entering high school I was introduced to
the wonderful world of shop class by our
teacher Phil LEM cow and he blew my mind
every single day he connected the the
chemistry the physics the mathematics
that we were learning in the classroom
almost the physical world around us he
taught me and taught anyone willing to
listen just how much the world counted
on those that understood the way that
that an electron flowed through a wire
or even just how a toilet flushed
I was surprised though again because the
school was just so nonchalant about what
it was that he was teaching us I I don’t
mean to imply that that what we gained
from the 5060 hours that we spent on The
Scarlet Letter was somehow not important
but but this guy over here he was
letting out all the secrets to how the
world worked and no one was paying any
attention it wasn’t just in my little
school either all across the country
shop classes like his were were being
shuttered and forgotten retired with
retiring shop teachers the only real
introduction to a career in the skilled
trades had been removed from the
curriculum through our words and through
our actions as well we have been
teaching our children that careers in
the skilled trades are to be settled for
when all else fails them rather than
strived for you know I have a
two-year-old son myself now his name’s
David and before too long he’s going to
be looking to me for guidance about what
to do was the productive part of his
life and his path and I want to make
sure that what I pass on to him tells
the whole story careers in the skilled
trades are not just dirty stinky nasty
jobs that nobody really wants but that
somebody has to do sure the the plumber
that you called to fix your sink may
show up with a little mud on his shoes
or he may get some water on the sleeve
of his shirt as he’s working but with an
average income up over fifty five
thousand dollars a year that plumber is
making the same as the average college
graduate have you seen the inside of
modern American manufacturing facilities
they have more in common with well-lit
laboratories than they do the
post-industrial revolution workhouse in
your mind’s eye the manufacturing sector
right now today has millions of open
physicians just waiting for the right
candidates with the right skills and the
right training to walk through their
doors I’m not trying to tell you that I
think that colleges are bad in fact some
of my best friends are college graduates
a four-year degree is a prerequisite for
some wonderful and some rewarding
careers and it’s exactly the right
choice to make for about a third of
those that under college but out of ten
students entering college this year only
three of them will both graduate and
take a position that requires the degree
that they have earned a full five of
those half of those students will feel
the shame and the embarrassment of
dropping out and find themselves making
an average of five thousand dollars a
year less per year than their high
school classmates that never entered
college the last two of those ten will
graduate and then be unable to find a
career using that degree that they have
worked so hard and taken on so much debt
to earn we have created an educational
system wherein the high schools are
graduating students that are largely
unprepared to enter the skilled trades
and that treats those in the career-tech
and vocational programs as second-class
students that are unable to hack it
academically in the real schools we are
shoveling our high school graduates into
colleges telling them to feel around and
and to grab a hold of something that
they connect with or feel a passion for
and and take on just whatever debt is
necessary to get through that program we
are leading our children to believe that
if they apply themselves if they really
work hard they will be able to find a
wonderful and rewarding career doing
whatever it is that they choose to do
unfortunately the workplace doesn’t look
at a list of of how many history majors
are graduating this year and then create
that number of historian jobs the
workplace is crying out to us for
skilled workers to build to maintain to
manufacture our world I think that it’s
important that we start listening to
them
I think that it’s time that we start
encouraging our friends and our children
to pursue those careers in the skilled
trades rather than settling for them we
must change the way that we think and
the way that we teach our children to
think about preparing for a career we
must teach them that a career in the
skilled trades is clean is wonderful is
rewarding is well-paying is stable and
is not beneath their station we must
push our schools to bring back those
shop classes and to begin treating and
teaching those skills with the same
esteem the same reverence that they
garner in the workplace we need to
identify those corrosive stereotypes
those well-meaning prejudices within
ourselves and begin supporting our
children when they come to us and say
when I grow up I want to be a mechanic
thank you
[Applause]
[Music]
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