Start prepping NOW for your dream job or work-anywhere trade skills!
Hone Your Welding Skills While Preparing for Certification
In our current digital-dominant world, there’s something particularly appealing about someone who still makes a living with their hands. Do you have more of an analog, old-school soul? Do you enjoy working with your hands to build machines that last lifetimes? Are you captivated by welding, fabrication and metalwork? If this sounds like you, then a career in the welding industry could play right into your hands. Take a truly hands-on, deep dive into the time-tested, world-building realms of welding, fabrication and materials joining through this two-year pathway. If you want to break into this industry and learn what it takes to earn your living as a certified welder, this program will surely get you fired up.
What You'll Learn
From 9th grade upward, enroll in A-G approved courses to start preparing for your skilled trade career. Classes include:
- Year 1: CTE Concentrator Welding & Fabrication | UC/CSU Approved as “F” Visual and performing arts
- Year 2: CTE Capstone Welding & Fabrication | UC/CSU Approved as “G” Elective
- Want to continue in this pathway? Enroll in one of the following for a third or fourth year:
- CTE Leadership/Internship Directed Studies (with teacher approval) | UC/CSU Approved as “G” Elective
- Ventura College: WEL V01 Introduction to Welding (dual enrollment)
What You’ll Do
Take what you’re learning in the classroom into the real world and experience for yourself all that awaits you in the time-honored and always-needed skilled trade industry. Hands-on, immersive experiences include:
- Intensive welding work
- Professional guest speakers
- CNC Machining
- 3D Modeling/Computer-Aided Design (CAD)
- Advanced Manufacturing
- Blueprint reading
- Field trips to local industry partners and colleges to explore potential career paths
Who You Can Be
Kickstart your career path with top-tier academic instruction and industry-leader insights. The Welding program prepares you for potential careers such as:
- Certified Welder
- Certified Union Welder
- Product Designer
- Aerospace Welder
- Welding Engineer
- Underwater Welder
- Robotic Welding Technician
Industry Average Wages: $54,000–$125,000
Projected Industry Growth: 12-16%
What You Need to Know
VUSD’s Welding CTE pathway prepares students for successful careers in the skilled trade industry, with a particular focus on welding and fabrication work. Students (grades 9 and up) learn vital skills such as tool safety, project planning, project construction and project finishing. The program is based at Buena High School and consists of two sequenced year-long courses, a concentrator followed by a capstone.
Students learn and sharpen skills with extensive welding experience under high-level direction. Students also benefit from respected guest speakers within the skilled trade industry, as well as partnerships with Tri-Counties Sheet Metal Workers' JATC training facility and renowned local businesses like Haas Automation, Clark Fabrication, Elite Plating, Royal Hydraulics and C&R Molds. Students emerge from this truly hands-on program with enhanced skills, confidence, direct access to a powerful career pathway.
Once you have gained the skills and knowledge in this pathway, there are many options for your next steps after high school - some you can even begin pursuing before you graduate!
1 Year
Welding Technology, Certificate - Ventura College
Industrial Technology and Fabrication, Certificate - Ventura College
2 Year
Welding Technology, Associate in Science - Ventura College
4 Year
Bachelor of Science, Industrial Engineering - California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo
Bachelor of Science, Manufacturing Engineering - California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo