Lane Tech High School

Summit High will be county's first school to offer engineering program

When Williamson County schools open in the fall, Summit High School will join the ranks, offering students at that school something unique.

Through the Career and Technical Education program, Summit will be the first in the county to offer its students an engineering program, designed to give students practical experience upon graduating as well as a solid foundation for future study in college.

“Engineering is the basis of problem-solving,” said Kris Schneider, who will teach the first classes. She attended a 13-day training session this summer to get prepared. It is “the basis of life.”

When Summit High was still under construction off of Buckner Lane in Spring Hill, its newly appointed principal, Charles Farmer, was thinking of ways for the school to be special beyond its newness, to offer something no other schools offered. And, with a healthy respect for career and technical courses, he said he selected engineering because most of all it is a gateway. A student can be ready for the workforce and college, he said.

It also combines one of the biggest educational trends to date, which is a cross-curricular study of science, technology, engineering and math, or STEM.

Getting more U.S. students up to speed in those subject areas is considered essential to being competitive in the emerging global economy.

At Summit, besides engineering, students may also select elective courses in culinary arts, health sciences, early childhood studies and marketing and media, all coursework offered at other high schools in the district. At least a few high schools offer related engineering-type programs such as Auto CAD drafting and science and technology classes.

Because Summit will start with ninth and 10th grade, the school will first offer an introduction to engineering and then principles of engineering. There are already 69 students signed up to take the classes.

The goal is to offer four years of engineering classes. But it will be the students who will determine what future coursework will be offered, said Sarah Lamb, the school’s assistant principal. The hope is that eventually a number of courses will be offered as more students and more teachers come on board with the program, Lamb said.

Summit High’s program will fall under the Project Lead the Way program, a national, nonprofit organization created to promote science, technology, engineering and mathematics, or STEM education, in the classroom. The program in some ways will also mirror Cleveland High School of Cleveland City Schools’ successful program, which also uses Project Lead the Way.

A Chicago Sojourn: Lane Technical High School

Lane Technical College Prep High School (architect John C. Christensen) is a Gothic icon on Western Avenue, a break from the relentlessly dense and unplanned commercial onslaught that lines Chicago's longest street. Lane Tech occupies a full city block (or more); the building is beautifully and artfully planned, with enormous spacious grounds surrounding an equally enormous building complex. Founded as Albert G. Lane Technical School in 1908, it is the city's largest high school, housing over 4,000 students. You would never guess at a glance that this building was finished in 1934. The red brick Gothic style was highly out of favor by that point, both from an artistic and economic standpoint, but apparently it was decided to press onwards rather than redo drawings that had been completed several years prior. The result was a building that was out of style before it was even built - but still remains highly impressive today. The attitude toward industry and manufacturing in these paintings is startlingly divorced from that of today. Whereas we see factories and refineries as eyesores to be minimized and avoided, these paintings celebrate them as welcome additions to even the most bucolic of landscapes. A steel mill alongside a lake is a thing to be celebrated, not mourned. It's a fitting attitude for a building whose scale is that of a factory, an industrial-sized seat of learning. The wood reliefs were carefully restored just a few years ago. One, entitled Evolution of the Book , is in a WPA-influenced style similar to the Century of Progress murals. The other, Control of the Elements by Peterpaul Ott, is pure Art Deco - stylized, geometric, streamlined, and utterly amazing. Both were designed by teachers and executed with the help of students.

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