Reaching One Classroom at a Time: NPHS Welding

Jun 04, 2025

NORTH PLATTE, Neb. (KNOP) - This week’s Reaching One Classroom at a Time grant with The North Platte Public Schools Foundation and Fat Dogs is being given to a North Platte High School educator.

The welding program at North Platte High School recently received a CNC plasma table. Welding teacher and Skills U.S.A. advisor, Nathaniel Foster, is putting the grant money toward a remote for the table so that the machine can be moved without using a computer.

“When we’re loading a couple hundred-pound sheets onto the table, we can have that around a lanyard and move the gantry or the plasma wherever we want to go. When we’re cutting parts and stuff, we can zero out the machine and set stuff up where we need to and save a lot of back and forth through the shop to get to the computer,” Foster said.

The high school offers a variety of welding classes with different skill levels.

“We offer a few welding classes: An introduction to skilled technical science where they get three weeks of woodworking, three weeks of welding and three weeks of automotive. We just do the basics of getting started, safety and measurement. We run a Welding I, a Welding II and we also have a dual credit welding class out at the college,” Foster said.

Having a welding program at North Platte High School has made a difference in how kids view trade programs.

“It’s really cool to be able to have students that wouldn’t typically get into the shop-setting environment. They get to see that maybe there’s something for them, or it’s not as bad as they thought it was and get rid of some of those stigmas associated with trade work,” Foster said.

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