On Tue, 15 Jun 2010 08:21:53 -0400, "Ala"
wrote:


"Michael A. Terrell" wrote in message
...

Al Dykes wrote:

In article
,
wrote:
When I was in school, these were every boy's favorite, and almost the
only useful education we got.

The Voc-Tech I attended mumble decades ago had a first-class 3 year
machine shop program. I'm told it's now a good computer CAD/CAM
course.

They also had college-track electronics and mechanical engineering
programs. The Mech students got several semesters in machine shop.
There was nothing like that for us Electrical majors.


I got two years of metal shop, three years of wood shop, two of
drafting and two of electronics in the seventh through twelfth grades in
the '60s.

The school councilors wanted me to take a different path, and kept
harping on "wasting your IQ". I didn't want to go to medical school or
law school. I wanted to work with my hands. To build things from
scratch. I still have my drafting table, and I've been out of school
for 40 years.




we didn't have a school counselor. We didn't really have anyone to help us
figure out how to get ahead in life after we graduated.
It was a terrible school. The curriculum was so easy and I was so bored.
My favorite time was when a teacher told me that I was underachieving. I
asked her given I had all As how that was possible if there wasn't a farther
goal post.
I wish I had been witty enough to say, yea well you are underteaching.


That would be cool not to have a counselor, all they did for me was
stick there nose in where it doesn't belong and screw everything up.
I went to 7 different schools in 12 years and they seem to test 10
times as much as they teach. I would read the book maybe 3-4 chapters
ahead and do most of the work for fun with nothing but scribble notes,
then never turn in home work, and then ace the tests. In one school
there where three of us A (test) students that sat together and day
after day we would double check with each other for those few
questions we where unsure of so we all had 100% correct and then
randomly change two to be wrong. The teacher would try to ridicule the
under achievers by calling out the scores as she handed them back, her
face was priceless trying glare through to the puzzle of how we got
the same score all the time, but from different questions. I had to
take a wood shop class, about all I learned was how the dominant males
got all the teachers time and tools and how us geeks gathered and did
other things. Same thing with sports.

Last weekend I was at a graduation party (they had around 28 in the
whole class) and was fascinated how some started hitting a volley ball
to each other in a circle. As time went by more and more would join
and they all played being very considerate of one another. It was so
alien to me, and drove home how really screwed up my childhood was.



Is Ala a moniker? I saw parts of a movie last night with that name in
it.

SW