Jordan Sommerfeld hasn't yet graduated from high school, but he has no doubt he'll earn a decent living.
"My family always told me to find something you love to do so you don't end up being one of those people who hates going to work," said Sommerfeld, 17, of Penn Hills.
An "A" student who took advanced classes because he enjoyed the challenge, Sommerfeld entered the Penn Hills School District's automotive technology program when he was a junior.
This year, he and fellow senior Todd Whitmore, 18, also of Penn Hills, placed third in a state automotive skills competition, which netted them scholarships to study applied science at the University of Northwestern Ohio in Lima.
Getting such training at the home school district is rare in Allegheny County, though.
Of the 43 school districts in the county, only Penn Hills, McKeesport and the Pittsburgh Public Schools operate their own vocational training programs.
But with steadily declining participation locally in vo-tech, Penn Hills School District officials are mulling a decision on whether to continue offering career training, or scrapping the program in favor of sending students to the Forbes Road vo-tech in Monroeville, where about 90 of the district's pupils already attend.
A district committee has recommended continuing the in-house training. And the district's curriculum coordinator, Daniel Lujetic, believes it is worthwhile to continue offering programs so long as the district is willing to make the commitment needed to "do it right."
"We definitely have some tough decisions to make," said school board member John Zacchia, the district's representative to Forbes Road. "There are benefits to the regional schools -- and our students will continue to have the option of going there if they choose -- but I think that we can continue doing it here. And with some work, we can really make it a first-class program, and boost participation."
In addition to Forbes Road in Monroeville, there are three other regional vo-techs -- A.W. Beattie in the north, Parkway West in the western suburbs, and Steel Center in the south.
Districts have moved students to the regional schools as they struggle to sustain their own programs, said John Sandrene, president of the state chapter of the Association for Career and Technical Education.
"Buying or upgrading equipment, adding programs to meet the needs of employers, finding qualified teachers or even getting enough students to enroll in a particular course can be very difficult for any single district to do," said Sandrene, who is director of the Steel Center Area Vocational-Technical School.
"It's much easier to sustain a program when the costs can be spread among a number of districts, and the pool of students is larger," he said.
Penn Hills officials are considering the variety of classes offered as they look at elimination. The district will drop its offering from eight programs to six in the fall because of low enrollment.
McKeesport -- to which Penn Hills officials are looking as a model to follow -- offers nine programs. The four regional vo-techs each offer between 14 and 20 programs.
Whether Penn Hills keeps its own programs or adopts the regional approach, the issue of erasing the negative stigma attached to vo-tech remains.
"We still get parents who think their child is somehow less successful if they don't go off to a four-year college," said Darby Copeland, assistant director at Parkway West Career and Technology Center in Moon.
"What they don't see is that a lot of people graduating with four-year degrees can't find work. The reality is, many of the fastest-growing and best-paying jobs are in areas where vocational and technical skills are needed," Copeland said.
