They have the student measure all kinds of parts: rockerarm shafts and piston pins and clutch plates. Minutia disguised as technique and great for micrometer practice but suspiciously resembling busywork. The student will enter his first shop thinking engine rebuilding is all about measuring seventy-five engine parts, whereas while rebuilding an engine is intense and meticulous work, observation and identification of bad parts is far more important than their dimensions. Specifications inevitably take the place of skill as training objectives in the world of mass mechanics certification. This struggle to be real-world plagues all technical schools.

That earnest student likely also found himself paired up with another who was unmotivated, who never bought the required tools, whose thoughts were on lunch, drugs and girls, not learning, and in too many cases whose legal guardian or government nanny paid his tuition in a doomed attempt to jumpstart Johnnie's way in the world. He fought discouragement each day as he hardly found a bike to work on that didn't have its wiring harness dragging on the floor and its most critical parts on backward or having been tossed out in the field behind the school. Mechanics schools absolutely consume motorcycle fodder. Dozens of classes, three daily shifts of students, storage issues, decreasing donations, budgets and staff, and time itself--all take their toll. The best schools stay on top of it, but entropy is always evident and disallusionment in both student and instructor is inevitable.

Tech schools are in trouble. They're experiencing a steep decline. Ironic, considering that trades are enjoying a renaissance, having finally escaping the clutches of the reculturalists who for the past thirty years tried to get us to believe that the world's workers will soon all be punching computer keyboards. Happily, the trades are again viable choices. But in the powersports industry, there is no rebirth. Something has got in the way. Schools are languishing. It's believed that mechanics school enrollment will increase again when the next economic downturn hits. We've observed this happening in the past. But something is different this time. The nation's most prominant mechanic's school is on virtual life support, several others with rich snd respected histories have closed their doors, and Gen Z or whatever they're called doesn't even know motorcycles exist. The industry is clinging desperately to an ever-shrinking riding demographic, leaving most OEMs much less interested in supporting vocational technical training than ever before, especially when they find themselves just one bad sales year from bankruptcy. It's sad to watch. And it makes me look back on my own trade school experience fondly.

Maybe it heralds a complete shift in what motorcycling will be. Electric vehicles are going to make a huge difference. Mechanics might become superfluous. Dealerships will likely disappear. The greasy grotto will become a mere historical footnote. The motorcycle's rumble seeping from body into soul will become extinct. I'm not against this. Completely apart from (and in disagreement with) the environmental implications of this change, I appreciate the inevitability of the obsolescence of the internal combustion engine. Its time is over. Rather, it's the changes to the industry that concern me. I am already nostalgic for the loss.