A heartfelt letter that made its way up the corporate ladder at
an auto parts company could mean the difference between a slipshod
shop class and a professional garage at Gilroy High School.
Gilroy
A heartfelt letter that made its way up the corporate ladder at an auto parts company could mean the difference between a slipshod shop class and a professional garage at Gilroy High School.
Students were crestfallen last year when they heard shop class might be canceled. With no teacher and a facility that was falling apart, the program was in danger of extinction.
But Mark Drelicharz, a shop teacher from Chicago, spent weeks of his own time whipping the shop into shape, bundling up the debris that littered the garage and restoring two of the four broken lifts to working condition, among countless other repairs.
“You should have seen it,” he said, hands tucked in his pockets as he surveyed the cavernous room. A rusted, 1966 black Mustang dominated the shop, suspended on one of the operable lifts.
“I thought I was in over my head,” he said. “The shop was a joke. We were in the negative and now we’re at least back to zero.”
One of the first orders of business was an annual assignment Drelicharz gives his students: write a business letter to an automotive company about the GHS program. Students had the option of requesting donations to spruce up the shop or sharing a recent experience with the company about their products. In the past, Drelicharz’s classes have received banners, T-shirts, pens and hats in return for the letters. This year, an especially earnest letter penned by one of Drelicharz’s 130 students, Cheyenne Strametz, 17, landed on the desk of Larry Samuelson, president and CEO of Napa Auto Parts.
“For the past three years I have taken nothing but full loads of boring classes which, to me, have no importance in daily life or my future,” the letter read. “I have been waiting since my freshman year to take automotives and I was ecstatic to be signing up for the class last semester, only to learn that we may not have an auto class for the mere fact that we do not have a teacher and more than half of the equipment in our shop was missing. My fellow classmates and I were devastated.”
The letter was so sincere, Samuelson said he was blown away.
“What she’s asking for was not so much for herself,” he said. “The kids that come after her are going to be the ones to benefit.”
As a result of Strametz’s letter, representatives of Napa are working with Drelicharz to devise a three-year plan for outfitting the shop with thousands of dollars worth of tools and equipment. Drelicharz’s wish list included everything from lifts and tire machines to wrenches and hammers.
“It’s a dream come true,” Drelicharz said. “They’re giving us everything and anything we could ever want.”
The company spared no expense and told Drelicharz not to insult them by asking for too little. At Samuelson’s behest, a representative flew up from San Diego to check out the shop and talk to Drelicharz about an overhaul.
“There wasn’t a whole lot of anything that wasn’t nailed down,” said Dave Lloyd, western regional manager for Napa. “I have more tools in my personal toolbox than the entire school has. But Mark has poured himself heart and soul into that place.”
“The before pictures were just horrid,” Samuelson agreed. “An auto shop should look like a real shop. It should have all the tools. It should be clean.”
Strametz said the letter that sparked the positive chain of events was fueled by the passion she saw in her new teacher. Bound for cosmetology school in San Francisco next fall, she has no plans to pursue a career in automotives, she said. But the girl who didn’t even know how to check the oil in her truck now knows how to rotate and patch tires, check her brakes, lights and horn, and change her oil.
“He really motivated us,” she said of Drelicharz. “He has a lot of energy and relates to us on our level.”
Before Drelicharz arrived, shop class was a place where kids went to slack off, students said. Now, students who had never even turned a screwdriver are learning the ins and outs of automotives.
“Kids I know who have been gangsters since junior high – they’re in here after school now,” Strametz said.
Napa staff said they expected the first shipment of supplies to arrive before the end of the semester.
“Kids that aren’t strictly academic get the short end of the stick sometimes,” Samuelson said. He hopes Napa’s donation will turn that trend around and inspire other local companies to pitch in with donations.
“I was surprised – I didn’t think it was that big of a deal,” Strametz said of her letter. “I guess we got lucky.”
