Editor’s Note: This article was originally published in the April print edition of The Kewanee Voice, Business Review.

A Kewanee Ford dealership is launching a new and innovative approach to introducing young people to a future career as an automotive technician.

Gustafson Ford Technician Pipeline is in its infancy stages, said owner Kurt Gustafson.

“I’m working on a technical pipeline for our organization,” he said.

His dealership, located in downtown Kewanee, is in a growth stage and work is underway to expand the service department into the building once occupied by the bowling alley.

“I would say it’s 40 percent complete,” Gustafson said.

The new addition will provide several more service bays and open up the opportunity to hire more technicians, but finding those technicians isn’t always easy.

“It’s very specialized, complicated,” he said. “So it’s imperative to have Ford-certified technicians,” he said.

For several years, he and Courtlin Gustafson, the dealership’s retail manager, have set up their tables at career fairs, colleges and vocational fairs, in an effort to recruit workers for their business. What surprised both of them is how many young people flocked to their booth for information.

“There’s interest,” said Courtlin Gustafson.

But Kurt Gustafson said he had a lightbulb moment when he was speaking with a student in Chicago who already had plans to work at a dealership in a suburb close to his family. Gustafson said young people often want to stay close to friends and family and if that was the case, Gustafson decided to focus his efforts on recruiting at the Kewanee school district level.

Just recently, Gustafson met with Kewanee High School faculty. KHS added a mechanic course just this spring, taught by Dave Armstrong. The school has a shop, a hoist and is a way for “students to engage in automotive repair and see if it’s an area they want to pursue.”

“We need to connect with kids at the high school level. Kewanee kids have a higher propensity to stay in Kewanee where their friends and family are,” he said.

Gustafson said he hopes to work with the school district to be able to develop a curriculum that would allow the students to start their careers at Gustafson Ford.

“It’s a starting point for someone who doesn’t have a certification and a way for them to test the waters, “ he said. “What we’re trying to create is for them to take this kind of instruction at Kewanee” and move on to the next phase of their training.

Gustafson said there are several routes for certification that are available to young people. They can go straight into school, the hard and fast way, which requires students to attend one of the Ford certification schools located in Chicago, Champaign or Des Moines. That route takes 66 weeks.

“Or they could come into the dealership setting with us and they’d have a different pathway of achieving certification,” he said.

That alternate path involves eight week rotations alternating between working in the shop and taking training courses.

Another slower path to certification is to work at the dealership while taking the courses online.

“It’s a great way for young people to learn a trade hands one,” he said.

With the high cost of continuing education, Gustafson sees more industries and businesses opting to form pipelines. And reaching out to local young people could hold the key for an industry that is in need of technicians.

“In our area, what we are trying to establish for kids is a more clear vision of what the pathway could be. There are opportunities in Kewanee. I think there’s a stigma that there isn’t opportunity when there is,” said Gustafson.

Gustafson said choosing to stay in Kewanee and work has its benefits.

“There’s job opportunities and if they can work to achieve that certification, there are pay scales,” he said. “The cost of living in Kewanee is very affordable. It’s centrally located between Peoria and Quad Cities. For me, if you’re living in Kewanee and achieve this kind of station, it creates more net disposable income.”

Gustafson said there is also financial assistance for young people who attend certification school in the form of scholarships and internal assistance to help with books, tools and training costs.

Gustafson sees his pipeline program as new, innovative and a work in progress, but ultimately, he would like to see the first graduating class from the pipeline by next spring. He also believes that the proactive approach to recruiting needed workers could prove to be the future. It also has the blessing of the Ford Motor Company.

“Ultimately this will help many businesses, not just mine,” he said.