Platinum™ and Full-Time at 18, Aluminum Tech Says Shop ‘Kept It Fun’ During Her Apprenticeship

07/15/2024 by I-CAR

Shortly before her May 2024 high school graduation, Emma Chambers made one of the biggest decisions of her young life. The talented volleyball player walked away from the chance to qualify for a sports scholarship and go to college. This cleared the way for an equally big decision: to concentrate on her budding career in collision repair and accept a full-time position at Andy's Auto Body Collision Repair in the small southeastern Illinois town of Vandalia. She first came to the Gold Class® shop as an apprentice in June 2023 midway through a two-year auto body program at her high school.

Student Interns Are Still Kids

Chambers' dedication to volleyball and a collision repair career represents the two worlds she straddles as an 18-year-old. The time of her girlhood is not quite over. She'll still “got game,” maintaining her wicked float serve in friendly volleyball matches and will continue in 4-H another year. “I want to go out with a bang and do seven projects for my last year,” she told the 4-H leader she's been with since third grade. Like many teenagers, she is saving for a car; although unlike most of her peers of either sex, she owns a 1994 manual Ford F-150 she vows to keep “even if it stops running and I have to keep it as a lawn ornament.” Buying a truck almost twice as old as she is, that she'd need to continually work on, was a step the teen took in a new and grown-up direction.

Chambers' apprenticeship at Andy's Auto Body let her balance the activities of her youth with a new interest in collision repair. “You could have some fun learning the job and didn't have to jump right into being an adult.” Chambers says shop owner Andy Powell “was very relaxed. It was okay you couldn't always come to work because of sports or homework. He understands high school students are still kids.”

Chambers never took unfair advantage of her employer's flexibility. She took her apprenticeship seriously, and so did Andy's Auto Body. She was encouraged to kick the tires on a collision repair career and was put to work in each station for one week. She liked body work best and settled into non-structural tasks and also practiced welding.

She also was encouraged to take I-CAR courses under the shop's subscription plan. She ran with that opportunity all the way to the Platinum™ finish line. She became Platinum while still in high school in the non-structural role and is well on her way to a second Platinum in structural.

Chambers' experience at Andy's influenced the next steps she'd take after graduation and eased her transition into the workforce. Knowing she could grow and train on the job as much as she wants was an important consideration as Chambers weighed the option to continue her education and extend her volleyball experience at the college level.

You have to put yourself in Chambers' volleyball shoes to appreciate the difficulty of her decision. For most of her life, her identity has revolved around being an athlete. And a good one at that who's been at it since at age eight.

“I started getting good in high school. I gave volleyball my all,” she says. She has injuries to her elbows, knees, and shoulders to back that claim. “I had D3 ranking potential, even D2.”

Had it not been for the opportunities she was given at Andy's Auto Body, Chambers might be on her way to volleyball practice at a college campus instead of reporting to work today as a collision repair tech.

Family Influencers

Chambers emphasizes, “I knew nothing, and I mean nothing, about cars. And I never wanted to get my hands dirty. I was a 'girlie' girl.” She doesn't come from a 'car family,' yet the two biggest influencers in her career choice were family: her pops (grandfather), who didn't live to see her enroll in collision repair at school, and her older brother and role model Brodie, employed at a manufacturing company as a welder.

Following her brother's path to the high school's vocational training center, Chambers wanted to “try something different my junior year. I did well in school but I was tired of sitting in classes all day.” Collision repair filled the bill.

“It was so new to me, and I found it interesting. I wasn't there to stare at the boys.” She did, however, enjoy advancing ahead of her all-male classmates. “They would tell me, 'You do the roof. You go first.' It wasn't to be polite. I knew they wanted to see if I could it. I worked hard and moved ahead, and the boys fell behind me.”

At the same time, she kept other options open. She continued taking dual-credit classes that could apply to a two-year associate's degree. “I thought about studying business or accounting. I'm good with numbers.”

Hoping her daughter would continue in school and volleyball, Chambers' mother had concerns about the new trail Emma was blazing in the family. She'd be one of the first of her female cousins to choose a blue-collar job. In the end, “my mom was very supportive of my choice. She just wanted to make sure I thought it through.” Chambers says she heard 'you could get hurt' a few times and was once teased 'you won't last a day' by someone who underestimated her determination, but generally “everyone was excited for me.”

Chambers wishes her 'pops' could see her today. She calls him her hero, who bravely fought three bouts of cancer. She's sure he would have approved of her decision. “He loved cars and airplanes. I remember stories he told about the Dodger he had when he was young.” Chambers also recalls what he said about working in the trades. “He thought it was tough on the body, and he advised to always use safety equipment.” Chambers took heed and formed the habit in high school to always wear safety glasses, respirators, and other PPE.

Amazing Opportunities

While set on exploring a trade in high school, Chambers sort of stumbled into collision repair. The mechanics and welding programs were full, but she was just one of five students enrolled in auto body her junior year.

“A lot of (high school) kids think auto body is not tough enough for them; but it's tougher than they think,” Chambers says. The attitude she got was: “You're in auto body? Oh well, you're a girl. I get to do welding. I get to do mechanics.” Chambers says high school students aren't aware of what they're passing over. “I told them I weld too. I do mechanics too. Auto body is a little bit of everything.”

Chambers believes apprenticeships are the best ways to bring youth into the industry and feels especially lucky to have landed at a Gold Class shop like Andy's Auto Body. Interning was “very different from school. I knew what things like grit and filler were. But PDR, what's this? Reverse priming? Wow, what's that? Not having to wet sand, that made my life easier. I was the happiest person around. Everything was new and so cool to me. I liked sanding, fixing hail damage on roofs, all the stuff no one else wants to do, well, except scuffing. I don't like scuffing. It's not much fun.”

Chambers' first job coach, the other female tech at Andy's, showed her the ropes of detail. “She really helped me get through the stress of my first week.” Chambers got a lot out of working with a different tech from each work station. “I do best by first watching how something's done. Everyone was so helpful. It was like I had a lot of big brothers.”

Chambers took full advantage of the I-CAR training available to her at Andy's and early into her apprenticeship, set her sights on Platinum. Attaining this recognition “is huge to me. I want girls to see that if I did it, they can do it too. Male or female, young or old, you can make a name for yourself like I did with Platinum. Just do it!”

“Andy's given me amazing opportunities. I am not going to pass any of it up,” she says. With a lot of practice and help from one of her primary mentors, an auto body tech with a decade of experience, Chambers recently passed I-CAR welding certification testing for aluminum welding. “We don't get a lot of aluminum work, but when we do, I'm the shop's aluminum tech.”

When you're 18, the future is a vast place. Chambers believes she's already found where she can be happiest. “I'm learning and having fun and really like where I'm at.” She says she wants to stay at Andy's for the long-term…even if she has to scuff a lot of paint.