Lynn School Dept. seeks to revamp Tech shops

LYNN – The Lynn School Department is moving forward with a plan to re-name and re-vamp the vocational shops at Lynn Vocational and Technical Institute this summer, a move that will result in the closure of four vocational programs.Superintendent Catherine Latham, who first proposed the changes in early May, said the department has been working with the department of education to change the name of some shops to match Chapter 74 vocational schools regulations.For example, the electrical shop will now be called electricity and the TV broadcasting shop is renamed radio and TV broadcasting.The name changes to shops are minor compared to the changes the school will have to make if the proposed school department budget passes through the School Committee later this month.The $107.4 million plan suggests closing the school’s machine, marketing and painting/drawing shops and calls for the phasing out of the early childhood and computer assisted design (CAD) programs.While CAD will remain for another year so that current juniors can complete the program, Latham said the other four shops will meet their demise at the end of this year, with students moving to another shop of their choice.”The students will be absorbed into the other shops,” she said. “I think of these four shops they are among the least subscribed shops in the school, there were other factors that went into the decision (to close shops) but that was a major one, the number of students. Some shops are working over there and some just aren’t.”Latham says all of the equipment from the shops will remain, including machine shop, where adult night courses will still have the opportunity to use the facilities.In the future, Latham hopes to re-vamp the machine shop and re-open with a new engineering component that could also potentially take some of the elements of the CAD shop as well.Although, like everything else, the plan is contingent on funding, Latham said she hopes to start working on establishing that shop as soon as possible.Although Tech is losing four shops and the teachers that accompany those programs, the high school is actually one of the few areas in the department’s budget that will see an increase in funding next year, nearly $900,000 over fiscal year 2009.Latham has said the increase in cash will help the school add more academic electives to align its curriculum with Classical and English, and fund a full-time Spanish teacher as well as an additional social studies teacher.The School Committee has scheduled a public hearing on the budget Thursday, June 25 at 6 p.m. at Lynn Vocational and Technical Institute. Any member of the public can come, share ideas and make potential amendments to the spending plan that evening prior to a committee vote.