MIDDLETON — For years, welding students have made the sparks fly in always-full adult education classes at North Shore Technical High School. On Monday night, a student cut the power to the powerful arc welding machines for the last time.
Next week, the school's other adult class for a different type of welding will end, edged out by a high school machine technology program that needs the space for high-tech, computer-driven equipment.
"For welding itself, I've filled probably every seat for every semester since 1983," said Glenn Tarpinian, the school's adult education director by night and a biology teacher by day.
The 10-session arc welding class had as many as 10 students, with some people hoping to bring a new skill to their jobs, some trying to launch different careers and some just learning for the sake of learning. Perhaps typical of the students was Nick Pereira of Peabody, who works as a nickel plater but hopes his welding education can give him more options in the machine shop where he works.
"I've been wanting to take welding for over a year now," he said. "A lot of the guys at work have had this class."
Moments later, an eerie blue glare lit his welding booth through a translucent orange curtain with holes burned through it.
North Shore Tech Superintendent Amy O'Malley said the high school's machine technology class is expanding as more robotics and pre-engineering equipment is brought in. That program, which can supply trained students to local businesses such as General Electric's aircraft engine plant and Middleton Aerospace Corp., is important to the North Shore economy, she said.
"Unfortunately, we just needed additional space. The welding equipment is in the machine shop," O'Malley said. "... If I had enough space to be all things to all people, I certainly would."
The high school students quit showing an interest in the welding program years ago, she said. Tarpinian said the machine classes were moved from Beverly in 1995 into what had been the Middleton campus' welding shop, eliminating the high school's welding program. Today, four arc welding machines survive in booths along one wall of the machine shop, which has a crowded floor. More computer-controlled machinery will arrive this summer.
Tarpinian said more programs could run at the same time if the school had more space, such as that proposed in a merger between North Shore Tech, Essex Aggie and Peabody's vocational program.
"They're trying to keep things state-of-the-art, and that requires square footage that we're really short on here. As much as I'd love to preserve (welding classes), I can certainly understand the needs of the day kids," he said.
That leaves students like Ricardo Silva of Beverly wondering what his next step will be. The assistant manager of a mall restaurant, he was hoping the welding classes could give him more options, perhaps in following a family tradition of welding.
"My uncle used to do that, so now I have an opportunity, maybe move up," Silva said.
Kevin Gerstner of Gloucester, who builds exhibits for the Peabody Essex Museum and teaches theater technology at Rockport High School, said welded steel becomes a better bet for some projects as wood prices climb. He spent two years trying to get into North Shore Tech's class and wants to see if he can find more welding classes at Northeast Metro Tech in Wakefield or Whittier Tech in Haverhill.
"It's handy for my job and handy for a lot of people's jobs," Gerstner said.
Zeke Zannotti, who claims to have been instructing the arc welding class since Abraham Lincoln was born, said one of his students has been building sets for films like "Gone Baby Gone." Students immerse themselves in the class and become passionate about welding, he said.
Zannotti expects to lose his North Shore Tech job, but the energetic quasi-retiree figures he'll find something else to keep him busy.
In his last classroom lesson at North Shore Tech, Zannotti cautioned students against overlaying too much metal on a butt weld, which can mean the steel gets overheated, then crystallized and made weaker. Then he showed them pictures from his welding jobs in I-93's southbound tunnels and high up on a building in Southie. His students paid close attention, asking about X-ray testing of his welds and marveling at the views from Zannotti's buildings.
"I feel safer up on the steel than I do on 128, believe me," he told them.
