KPU and Coquitlam School District’s partnership keeps shop classes running

The teacher becomes the student with Kwantlen Polytechnic University’s partnership with the Coquitlam School District. 

The Faculty of Trades and Technology created a two-week course to provide safety training to already-certified middle and high school teachers, allowing them to teach shop class at their schools.

The safety training will allow teachers to safely supervise carpentry, automotive, electrical, plumbing, and similar shop classes — without requiring a Red Seal certification.

Laura McDonald, dean of the Faculty of Trades and Technology, says shop teachers are required to have both a teaching credential and a Red Seal certification.

“What we’re asking of high school teachers that want to teach in the shop environment is to have both, so oftentimes they end up with more credentials than a typical high school teacher,” McDonald says. “This is a way to really bridge that gap.”

First piloted in 2025, the program has trained eight Coquitlam teachers to date.

It began from a meeting between KPU and school district representatives, where Benjamin King from the Coquitlam School District asked for a shop safety course to support shop teachers.

“This would basically allow us to, in certain situations, either reopen existing shops that had been closed to a lack of staffing or to keep shops open as retirements happen,” says Benjamin King, the district’s principal of career programs.

King says there are eight schools in the district with shop classes and each has three to six shops on average.

McDonald says she was keen to form the partnership because she did not like hearing that high school shops were not running due to teacher unavailability.

“A lot of high school teachers are really interested in teaching in shop environments, but don’t have anything to support them doing so. This gave us the opportunity to build a micro-credential that would give them the tools and the experience,” McDonald says.

Teachers will learn how to use different shop equipment, keep students safe, and perform basic maintenance on the machines. While the course is for beginners, it is also open to certified shop class teachers interested in practicing their skills.

Shop classes at two middle schools have already reopened, King says.

“Starting next year, we will have shops that have been closed for probably five or six years being reopened, and those students in that school now will have that as part of their rotation,” King says.

The safety training is designed and delivered by KPU trades instructors, namely Terry Williams, with all course content tested by KPU’s Red Seal employees to ensure it meets all safety requirements, McDonald says.

She adds that KPU has offered two cohorts of the safety training and hopes to expand it to other school districts in the Lower Mainland.

“We’d be very open to [partner with] school districts across the province and even across the country to upskill other instructors and give them that opportunity to keep the shop classes open and continue to support students in choosing their own adventure,” McDonald says.

“Opportunities like this one with the Coquitlam School District have … allowed us to have a conversation, listen, and be responsive to their needs and to an area that I hadn’t even considered.”