[FEATURE]
The Tech Shortage That Never Ends
by Chasidy Rae Sisk
Collision Instructors
Weigh In on
The ongoing technician shortage sometimes feels like The Song That Never Ends – it just keeps going and going! Around the country, industry professionals struggle to find and retain qualified help, and while many factors contribute to the lack of workers, it’s hard to imagine that this dilemma can be resolved without the assistance of the schools and instructors providing the next generation with their collision education. Curious about their thoughts on the topic, New England Automotive Report sat down with three local collision repair instructors: David Lelievre (Montachusett Regional Vo-Tech; Fitchburg), Kenneth Stukonis (Assabet Valley High School; Marlborough) and Tim Arruda (Upper Cape Tech; Bourne) who have taught for 15, 23 and six years, respectively. New England Automotive Report: How do the current number of enrolled students compare to past numbers? Why aren’t more students interested in a collision repair career? David Lelievre: We’re pretty fortunate to have good student numbers, but that’s not the case for many other schools around the country. Our numbers haven’t dropped at all; we actually have a waiting list. I’m not really sure what we do differently, but we work hard to keep the shop clean and well-organized to make sure it’s a good environment for kids to be in. Our shop is very busy, and the students seem to enjoy that. Our program has been filling up for the past eight years, and this year’s enrollment was the highest – we have seven kids on the waiting list. The number of kids that actually stick through the program is a little lower, and I think that's partially due to parents pushing their kids to go to college. Higher education is good, but it’s not meant for everyone, and it hurts the trades. There’s a huge skills gap in this country because too few young people are going into and staying in the trades. Additionally, kids are just different these days. They’ve changed a lot. Kids used to put their broken bicycles back together; they had tools in their hands in middle school. Now, some of these kids don’t even know what a Phillips screwdriver is, so we’re really starting from ground zero. I think that’s also why many who go to work in shops after graduation eventually leave the industry. Shops want to hire someone who’s immediately productive, but these new technicians require more training to be productive. A few local shops have some really good programs where they foster new techs’ talents or even offer incentive programs like giving them a toolbox after a certain 28 April 2022
New England Automotive Report
number of years, and we see those shops being more successful with retention. Kenneth Stukonis: Our numbers are really good, and my co-worker who works with the younger kids does a great job of bringing energy to the shop. Our shop is full with 64 students, but getting those numbers has never been our problem. That full shop at school doesn’t correlate to getting graduates into the trade; issues arise when we send them out into our industry. Around 40 percent of our kids are true “gearhead” types who will go into the trade, and the challenge is getting the other kids equally excited. The biggest problem comes down to money; it all trickles down to the Labor Rate. This is a flat industry, and since these young men and women are rarely earning $1 over minimum wage, they only stick with it for a little while. They can make $20 an hour at Amazon and enjoy an easier life than the grind of a body shop, so we’re up against that. Many of them are getting out in their early 20s due to a lack of financial backing. I know one young technician who loved working in a shop, but he left the industry because he’s earning an extra $10 an hour constructing steel buildings. I understand shop owners’ challenges when it comes to costs, but it’s a tough sell to attract kids to this industry when they see their peers in other trades earning so much more. Tim Arruda: It fluctuates. Since I teach the freshmen, I’m more involved with recruiting students to the collision shop, and the number one problem for recruitment is that kids are looking for what pays the most. With the Labor Rate situation in Massachusetts, that’s their biggest deterrent and the thing we have to combat. It’s hard to get them interested when they know they’re going to make about the same in a collision shop that they could make at Walmart, while their peers who study plumbing make good money right out of high school. NEAR: Why do you think that so many schools have cut their collision technology programs? DL: I don’t understand why that’s happening when there’s such a huge demand for collision repair technicians in this industry and everywhere else. Suppliers constantly tell me their shops would all hire three technicians immediately if they could find them. If the schools are shutting down programs due to a lack of student interest, they