Blog

April 11, 2017 Something’s missing April 22 has in recent times come into its own as a pseudo-holiday when organizers try to turn the country’s attention to environmental concerns. I’m all for keeping the environment clean – who isn’t? It’s like being for motherhood and apple pie. Yet I take...

March 28, 2017 A skilled trade requires smarts Pardon my rant, but when something annoys the hell out of me I have trouble keeping quiet. One of the things that sets me off is when college-educated people look down on the trades as something less intelligent people ought to aspire to. Less intelligent...

March 7, 2017 Way back when we carried slide rules rather than calculators to math classes, I attended and graduated from one of the best urban public high schools in the country – Lane Technical High School in Chicago. It still carries a reputation as one of the only public high schools within Chicago’s...

February 2017 Service firms also cry for trade workers Most of our economy has largely recovered from the devastation of the “Great Recession” that started in 2008. One notable exception is construction. Home building is still at recession levels, and one reason is a lack of workers. This report...

February 2017 College is increasingly a bad buy Last month the news media was filled with a story that ought to send a chill up the spine of anyone thinking of taking out a student loan to attend college. The U.S. Education Department admitted that it had miscalculated the repayment rates of student...

January 24, 2017 Skilled trades compete well with college grads According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), 68% of high school graduates go on to attend college. Young people face enormous pressure from family and friends to do so. The biggest reason is the belief you cannot find a good job without...

January 10, 2017 But vocational enrollments are up. Regular readers of this blog know that a consistent theme to my articles has to do with the fact that vocational education in a skilled trade is a worthwhile alternative to college for mechanically minded individuals. That message seems to be getting...

December 6, 2016 Act like a professional This will be my final blog on the subject of job readiness. The topic is professionalism. What does professionalism mean? One dictionary defines it as “the skill, good judgment, and polite behavior that is expected from a person who is trained to do a job well.”...

November 29, 2016 You must get along with people Some professions are typically characterized as a “people business.” Certainly anyone who sells for a living falls into that category. Public relations, politics and other fields also require advanced social skills on the part of their practitioners....