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Any Benefit to Trade School?

Dillon

Dillon

Well-Known Member
So for those who have been following for a while in regards to my job search it still has not been going to the point I just entirely quit my job search process this week. Counting 6 months now over 120 applications and a few dozens interviews I cannot stand feeing defeated, worthless, and depressed all the time.
I am thinking of a new plan which is going into trade school and I know trade schools are designed to help individuals gain hands on experience in a certain field. I have no hands on experience and employers want experience so I might as well do an alternate route on top of having already graduated with a masters degree.

What would be the potential benefits of trade school especially for an autistic individual? Pros and cons?
 
Learning a trade would be the great positive of it. Do you have a trade that you like in mind that's even remotely connected to some of the concepts you studied on your way to a master's?
I'm almost to have a bachelor's in English but I'm in the middle of a job working as a repairman in a plant.
Having a job, any good job, is worth something.
 
Gerontius said:
Learning a trade would be the great positive of it. Do you have a trade that you like in mind that's even remotely connected to some of the concepts you studied on your way to a master's?
I'm almost to have a bachelor's in English but I'm in the middle of a job working as a repairman in a plant.
Having a job, any good job, is worth something.
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I have my masters in marine/natural resources management which I cannot seem to get a job in at all. I would like to get into the medical or technology field of trade if it will help me get a full time job at least.
 
Let's put it this way. I went to college for four years for a job that never panned out. Though I finally ended up in finance and insurance underwriting after doing retail and warehouse work, which required a college degree. Nearly 20 years later I got out of that work and went to vocational school at 40 to learn website design for about ten months. While took months to find work, the entry level job I got paid considerably more than my insurance position at a senior level. Plus I got quite a nice increase after the first year of work, while technically still a contractor position.

Of course that was more than 25 years ago, but from my perspective one year of trade school paid off better than four years of college.
 
Electricians are in demand and it pays well.
Any students at the top of their class will be selected for new construction as opposed to doing repair work on existing systems.
Plumbers are in demand too, with the top students being selected for new install instead of repair work.
Brick layers and masons don't do bad either.
HVAC guys do fairly well out of the gate too.

Most of these are two year associate degrees.

Automotive is not a great choice due to a lack of experience and the cost restrictions placed on buying your tools.
Once you start buying automotive tools, you can never stop either because there is always a better mousetrap being offered.
Manufacturing isn't a great choice either because they are generally just looking for warm bodies to hold down the floors.
 
Can't forget welders either.
Production welders do all right, but the real money is in being a fitter.
 
Possibly see if there is any intern trade positions, if the need is high enough, they pay and train. It just depends on where you live. We have had employers begging for emergency techs for ambulances, offering to pay training. We also have a shortage of police employees. Great suggestions here, and you sound motivated to figure out the next step.
 
Dillon said:
I am thinking of a new plan which is going into trade school and I know trade schools are designed to help individuals gain hands on experience in a certain field. I have no hands on experience and employers want experience so I might as well do an alternate route on top of having already graduated with a masters degree.
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There's a couple of different ways that can play out depending on how you present yourself. Most proper tradesmen have a very dim view of trade school, I used to always complain that after you sent an apprentice for another block of trade school you'd have to spend the next two weeks training bad habits and dangerous practices back out of them.

Those that can do, do do. Those that can't teach at TAFE.

So completing a trade school certificate and trying to use that as a qualification will discourage people from taking you on. However, if you instead present yourself as someone who is so determined to get in to a trade that you started putting yourself through trade school shows initiative. Most tradespeople won't take on an apprentice any older than 17 because after that age people's mindsets change and it's much more difficult to teach them, but if you show a determination to learn this will impress them and encourage them to give you a go.

With physical trades an apprenticeship takes 4 years, and for another 4 years after that you would be considered to be of Journeyman status and not taken seriously as a tradesman, after that you can start earning real money.
 
I'm over 50. If I was university age again I wouldn't even THINK about going to college/uni for something that wasn't in STEM. Even degrees in certain STEM areas might be in jeopardy in the next ten years or so because of A.I.

Meaning, I personally would NOT think of getting a "liberal arts" degree in anything that ends with the word "Studies". 30 years ago and prior it was very rare for a person with a 4 year college degree in most anything not to end up getting a job. Very rare.

Today it's pretty common for people with 4 year degrees to not be able to find a job and therefore their degree was a waste of money. The college educated person working as a barista isn't a trope for nothing.

To that end I would not recommend my kids go to university for a non-specialized degree at all. People graduating from trade schools in fields such as construction, plumbing, welding, etc are not only finding jobs, they're often finding jobs with good benefits and good pay.
 
Outdated said:
There's a couple of different ways that can play out depending on how you present yourself. Most proper tradesmen have a very dim view of trade school, I used to always complain that after you sent an apprentice for another block of trade school you'd have to spend the next two weeks training bad habits and dangerous practices back out of them.

Those that can do, do do. Those that can't teach at TAFE.

So completing a trade school certificate and trying to use that as a qualification will discourage people from taking you on. However, if you instead present yourself as someone who is so determined to get in to a trade that you started putting yourself through trade school shows initiative. Most tradespeople won't take on an apprentice any older than 17 because after that age people's mindsets change and it's much more difficult to teach them, but if you show a determination to learn this will impress them and encourage them to give you a go.

With physical trades an apprenticeship takes 4 years, and for another 4 years after that you would be considered to be of Journeyman status and not taken seriously as a tradesman, after that you can start earning real money.
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Since everyone is from all over, I'm just going to note for those unaware that Outdated is from Australia.

If I may present a Canadian perspective, here, many employers only want to hire journeymen and refuse to take on apprentices, due to a variety of reasons, one major reason being the cost/investment in training for someone who might end up being poached by another employer or otherwise leave.

As such, for those who do take on apprentices, in certain fields, employers will quite often hire someone who is already in the apprenticeship system (e.g. minimum of "level 1" completed).

What that means is that someone wanting to enter the field would need to take a "pre-employment" program for several months which is intended to simulate the basics of working in that field, and then complete the level 1 training before finding an employer to take them on as they continue on the apprenticeship journey.

Something to consider is whether a trade has a union hiring hall. Where there's a union hiring hall, it usually makes employment much easier, since you just sign up, and are offered employment opportunities based on seniority, and there's no interviews or risk of an employer rejecting you for arbitrary reasons, though of course usual considerations (such as passing drug exams, where applicable) would still apply.
 
Magna said:
I'm over 50. If I was university age again I wouldn't even THINK about going to college/uni for something that wasn't in STEM. Even degrees in certain STEM areas might be in jeopardy in the next ten years or so because of A.I.

Meaning, I personally would NOT think of getting a "liberal arts" degree in anything that ends with the word "Studies". 30 years ago and prior it was very rare for a person with a 4 year college degree in most anything not to end up getting a job. Very rare.

Today it's pretty common for people with 4 year degrees to not be able to find a job and therefore their degree was a waste of money. The college educated person working as a barista isn't a trope for nothing.

To that end I would not recommend my kids go to university for a non-specialized degree at all. People graduating from trade schools in fields such as construction, plumbing, welding, etc are not only finding jobs, they're often finding jobs with good benefits and good pay.
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I am actually just know learning and distinguishing the differences between Uni and trade school where on one hand Uni doesn’t actually prepare you for a job and does not offer you real world skills while trade school seems not to work not teach you those hard technical skills but soft transferable skills as well.
While making decisions on colleges after highschool I was always led to believe that going to college was worth it and your degree will get you any kind of job and what a big lie that was. Trade schools never crossed my mind then as there was always more of the push for college/Uni and trade schools were looked down upon.

I actually regret my decision in doing both a bachelors and masters in biological sciences and natural resource management even going to college for that matter I mean 6 months later after graduating college and I can’t get a full time job is practically after ridiculous especially after putting in 5-6 years of work to pursue and achieve my goals.
 
I know someone whose son went to a great university, and hasn't landed a decent position three years later. My daughter came to me, and we discussed how a college degree didn't mean guaranteed job anymore after you graduated. It was difficult to have this type of discussion with her.
 
Dillon said:
What would be the potential benefits of trade school especially for an autistic individual? Pros and cons?
Click to expand...
Pro: Gainful Employment, resulting in a regular paycheck.
Con: Having to drag yourself out of bed every workday morning.
 
Dillon said:
Uni doesn’t actually prepare you for a job
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That's what co-op programs are for - to provide the work experience (and connections) to bridge the gap between the learning and applying it vocationally.

I always recommend that where available, that one consider co-op opportunities, especially as some employers use them to try out potential future employees and if they like one of their student employees, will often hire them upon graduation. I've also seen cases where the employer liked someone enough that the employer offered to hire them for regular employment at the end of their co-op term.
 
Are you located in the Pacific Northwest? Considering a move? In the Columbia River Watershed, there is incredible need for people with your qualifications.
 
Dillon said:
While making decisions on colleges after highschool I was always led to believe that going to college was worth it and your degree will get you any kind of job and what a big lie that was. Trade schools never crossed my mind then as there was always more of the push for college/Uni and trade schools were looked down upon.
Click to expand...

That's a view which hasn't really been applicable since the 1960s or so. The 1950s and 1960s provided a combination of post-war economic and population boom, in an era where tertiary education of any sort was still relatively rare, and so baby boomers who were able to complete post-secondary had lots of opportunities to parachute into. It was a right-place-at-the-right-time, but for an entire cohort.

Since then, post-secondary costs have increased significantly, and the return has dropped significantly, in part because so many people are completing degrees so they hold as much relative value as they once did.

That's where it's important to have and utilize connections, but also to build on skills and extracirriculars that help one differentiate themselves and stand out in the labour market.

Dillon said:
I actually regret my decision in doing both a bachelors and masters in biological sciences and natural resource management even going to college for that matter I mean 6 months later after graduating college and I can’t get a full time job is practically after ridiculous especially after putting in 5-6 years of work to pursue and achieve my goals.
Click to expand...

As I understood, and if I recall correctly, you had two job offers in your field.
 
From The Snake River to the Columbia River Delta in Astoria, Oregonians and Washingtonians take our watersheds and fisheries very seriously.

We have one of the top salmon yields in the world. And there are several hydrological dams and locks along The Columbia.

Down at the Delta, along the bar, and out at sea, field biologists are needed to board vessels and monitor the catch, to make sure that our yield is sustainable.

Along The Willamette River, a superfund site in the process of being restored, we are starting to get salmon, sturgeon, and even otters and sea lions as far inland as Oregon City.

We need biologists to monitor water quality and species all along the Columbia River Basin, and in our thousands of rivers and streams throughout the Cascade Range.

Portland for instance drinks unfiltered, unflouridated water from a fenced, protected lake up in the Cascade Range.

We also have several reservoirs just in the local area.

Your work is precious to people of the Pacific Northwest.

I'd seriously suggest you look over here. And if you are out of the country, a lot of these public and private entities that are so integral to our sustainable fisheries and resources recruit internationally, and will help you relocate.
 
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