Reply by stefang

I don’t know all the details in this instance, but I would tend to blame the teacher anyway. The girl should not have been allowed to use the machine unless she complied with safety rules. That said, maybe it’s not so easy to keep an eye on all students at once. Or is it? My thought is that safety should be the teachers top priority. I don’t believe the teacher should be unduly punished for this oversight, but it certainly is a serious enough to be noted on the record in case something like that happens again. I assume the student also learned something.

I didn’t attend wood shop as a youth, but I have heard a lot of scary shop stories from my own kids and others who did. They all involved revolving machine tools, mostly lathes, but others as well. My personal feeling is that teaching the proper use and maintenance of hand tools would be much cheaper, more instructive and valuable, especially for first year wood shop students. Though I doubt all wood shop teachers have those skills themselves. I know hand tools can also be dangerous, but usually not life threatening like a skew chisel being slung from a lathe and stuck into a door frame just as the teacher walks through it (True story, honest).

I realize hindsight is always better than foresight, but tough safety rules are really a must in a place where serious accidents can happen very fast and without warning.

-- Mike, American in Norway