Building better student opportunities

To stimulate students and maintain their interest in learning, Lawrence School District is establishing a vocational program for next school year that will teach the skills necessary for them to know how to build a bathroom.

There will be a morning and an afternoon class of eight to 10 students each that will meet daily. The classes are three periods in length and will be taught by Lee Wolin, a certified technology teacher. One period in the high school is 48 minutes.

The students will learn carpentry, plumbing, electrical work and tiling. In addition to those skills, academics will be a part of the curriculum as English, math and science will be embedded into the technology program.

“What we’ve seen in the schools are students interested in particular subjects and different programs,” said Lawrence Superintendent Gary Schall, who added that several students expressed a curiosity in learning these skills. “With kids who not yet found their passion this sparked an interest.”

Beginning the vocational program has taken a couple of years. Ellen Shurgan, who teaches family and consumer sciences, conducted the necessary research. Shurgan said that the district was looking for ways to expand its offerings and due to the new common core standards that require students to be “college ready” this program would give students an additional path toward graduation.

“The upside is it prepares students life after high school, where they can go into a credentialing program or college and study engineering,” Shurgan said. “Students learn by doing and by blending science and construction technology they will apply knowledge and not just answer questions on a test.”

Shurgan also pointed out that the students will also learn what she called “soft skills.” Such as being punctual for work and working as part of a team.

Learning how to build a bathroom incorporates several building trade skills and is a complete project, which is the primary reason it was selected, said Wolin, a chemistry teacher, who has taught overall for 20 years and six years at Lawrence High School.

By learning basic skills in various building trades, the students will have to read and comprehend instructions, use math for doing measurements and learn about physics through an understanding of stress loads.

Wolin noted that the curriculum is being established by the district, but an idea would be to begin the students with a bit of reading, teach then the application of the skills, then do small projects leading to the larger project. “One of the benefits is it gives students who are less focused and have less of a direction an idea of what these things are and it opens up many avenues for them.”

One of those avenues is possibly interning with one of several local contractors, said Schall, who added that a few have expressed an interest in providing those opportunities.

In addition, the superintendent said that the program is being conducted in partnership with SUNY Farmingdale and students can begin working toward an associate’s degree. “Doing this on an academic level opens up other possibilities,” Schall said. “We want to develop the skills the students do have.”