Blog

TEMPE BODY SHOP AMAZED BY COLLISION REPAIR PROGRAM’S $10K MAKEOVER GRANT

Any Tempe body shop is only as strong as its professional crew. Consequently, our people are only as adept as the foundations of their collision repair training. 

That’s why every Tempe body shop owes it to programs such as Southeastern Regional Vocational High School’s collision repair track in South Easton, Mass. to support grants such as the $10,000 Collision Repair Education Foundation award soon to fund an extensive department makeover.

Southeastern joins seven other secondary and postsecondary schools tapped this past November to be presented grants in Las Vegas at the 2015 Special Equipment Manufacturing Association Show. Teachers William Collins and Robert Morin collaborated alongside Southeastern Regional’s Collision Repair Advisory Board to produce a compelling grant application outlining how the vocational institution would utilize a full $50,000 to improve and update their department’s equipment. For their part, Collision Repair program students illustrated the impactful potential of the department’s instruction with an eye-opening video presentation of their own.

The Collision Repair Education Foundation’s scholarship and grant support for young men and women driven to pursue careers in collision repair comes 100-percent from charitable donations through the professional auto body repair industry and businesses such as our own Tempe body shop. An Education Foundation Board of Trustees selection committee chooses Ultimate Collision Education Makeover grant honorees annually to provide financial teaching material and equipment improvement assistance to schools that have already demonstrated outstanding commitment to vocational instruction.

As many veteran Tempe body shop professionals would attest, steel repair stations won’t necessarily adequately service aluminum parts. Hence, Collins, et al focused the much of their grant application and presentation on the benefits of purchasing a brand-new $6,000 aluminum repair station that will allow students to build hands-on experience with newer vehicles such as the all-aluminum Ford 150 pickup truck body. On top of the $10,000 runner-up Makeover Grant, the Collision Repair Education Foundation has donated additional safety equipment and instructional materials valued at an additional $14,000 just for submitting an application. Senior Collision Repair students will receive Cintas technician shirts and all departmental students will receive stocks of MCR Safety particle dust masks and safety glasses and 3-M abrasives and sandpaper for day-to-day projects.

If you’ve ever been amazed by the detail-oriented restorative work a Tempe body shop has poured into returning your vehicle to its pristine factory condition, by all means – thank institutions such as Southeastern Regional’s Collision Repair program and the Collision Repair Education Foundation.