St. Joseph the Worker Academy
Trades
Modus Operandi
The academy’s goal for the trades program is not that each of the boys becomes a tradesman. Rather, SJWA wants students to have:
A gymnastic contact with reality, in which the boys press and push against real (as opposed to virtual) things and allow the natural world to speak to them. This is why carpentry is at the core of our trades program.
A stronger work ethic. By persevering through adversity to see a beautiful project through to completion, boys will learn a skill that will reverberate elsewhere in their lives.
A “rite of passage” element of doing adult work with adults. When they are apprenticed by workmen in the community, they get to see how their mettle stacks up against reality in a clearer way than any contrived test.
Competency, where a boy can grow up able to do the “basic” house maintenance that was common 50 years ago. This also gives boys confidence that they can achieve things, which bolsters their confidence in the classroom.
Whether a student becomes a tradesman, goes to college, or enters seminary, the trades program at SJWA will set him well on the right track.
“In avoiding the sweat of the face, the drudgery of the thorns and the thistles, all of which are the punishment of sin, and which induce sloth and atrophy, the rich shirk work itself, which is not a punishment of sin, but a glorious, pleasurable exercise of human nature’s God-given faculties.”