Are you sure about that? I don't know when you're allowed to leave school in the US, but they're pretty popular in schools - relatively cheap tools & a lot safer than others. They didn't exist (in the mainstream at least) when I was at school, but we had laser cutter/engravers for example. I know which I'd pick if I were in control of the budget (and had to choose one).
Whether you're able to use the equipment for tasks outside of the specific class (even if it's school related like a science fair project) is another issue. I've seen different schools in the same district do things differently - one for instance allowed students to say use the media lab to record a drama production and had a maker club where students could use the machine shop for personal projects. Others very strictly restricted the use of school equipment for the specific class in question (e.g. only shop class students can use the machine tools and only for projects related to that class). It really depends on the instructor and the school administration.
My High School which was a fairly well funded public High School in Illinois, US hadn't upgraded their shop equipment since the 80s really it felt like. We had wood tools, saws, the basics only. The coolest thing we had was a smelting forge, but students weren't allowed to use it due to safety concerns. This was in the late 2000s.
