McPherson Faculty gives automotive restoration program to college students

MCPHERSON, Kan. – Paige Miltenberger at all times knew she’d develop as much as work on vehicles.

She’s been restoring previous vehicles together with her dad and grandfather since she was a child. However as a younger girl in St. Louis, she wasn’t discovering the coaching she wanted to repair up the classics.

“My technical highschool that I went to, it was all new stuff and simply common automotive stuff,” Miltenberger stated. “And it wasn’t that area of interest class of basic vehicles that I knew I wished to work on.”

Enter McPherson Faculty, the one school within the nation that gives a bachelor’s diploma in automotive restoration.

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“I knew I appreciated engaged on vehicles. I knew I appreciated engaged on previous vehicles particularly. And there isn’t any different program like this one. So, in my head, that is the one place I may have presumably gone,” the sophomore stated.

And it seems Miltenberger made the suitable selection – she’s one of many program’s high college students, who’s missed just one take a look at query to date this semester in TE 141 – Engine Rebuilding.

Miltenberger is only one of about 175 college students majoring in auto restoration at McPherson Faculty, a 138-year-old liberal arts school situated about an hour north of Wichita. The auto program turns 50 subsequent 12 months, a milestone for a college contributing to an trade that desperately wants extra employees.

In keeping with TechForce Basis, it’s projected that 85,581 new autoworkers might be wanted to fulfill demand. That quantity will enhance yearly, totaling greater than 350,000 by 2028.

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Engaged on basic vehicles is much more area of interest, making McPherson Faculty considered one of a sort.

“We contemplate the talents that we’re instructing heritage expertise. So they aren’t issues that college students are studying in store class, if there’s even a store class of their college anymore,” stated Amanda Gutierrez, vp for automotive restoration and engineering. “And so, from the woodworking to the hand fabrication of metallic, all the hand stitching of seats, issues like that, these are all expertise which are disappearing.”

College students be taught all facets of restoration, from engine rebuilding to portray panels, welding joints to stitching upholstery.

Andrew Dehn works with panel board and leather-based to make a door panel. (FOX Enterprise Community / Fox Information)

“Considered one of my favorites is college students who stroll into the trim lab, by no means touched a stitching machine of their life,” stated Gutierrez.

Noah Durham was a type of college students. He loves all facets of fixing up previous vehicles, however the consideration to element in upholstery and the emphasis on each sew being excellent appealed to him. It’s additionally a subject in excessive demand.

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“Nearly each store, after they come searching for individuals or asking for individuals to do upholstery,” stated Durham, a senior. “Lots of people aren’t doing that anymore. And it is change into very specialised, particularly on actually high-caliber vehicles like your Ferraris, Bentleys, Jaguars.”

Durham graduates in Might, however he’s already acquired a full-time job lined up. He’ll be working as a trimmer at a restoration store in Pennsylvania, specializing in European classics, making greater than $70,000 a 12 months.

Kennedy Batchelder cuts threads on a lathe at McPherson Faculty in McPherson, Kansas, on Oct. 15, 2025. (FOX Enterprise Community / Fox Information)

And he’s not distinctive – McPherson boasts a 95% job acceptance charge inside six months of commencement. And these aren’t simply jobs in restoration retailers. McPherson graduates are all around the nation working throughout a number of disciplines.

“They work in retailers, they personal their very own retailers. They work for museums, non-public collections, public sale homes as historic specialists, placing collectively the analysis and doing all of that,” stated Gutierrez.

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And in an more and more AI-driven world, auto restoration appears to be principally resistant to being changed by computer systems.

“AI shouldn’t be changing this,” stated Curt Goodwin, the college’s engine professor. “I speak about that once we’re assembling an engine, and also you’re turning that engine over by hand and feeling that every little thing is spot on, AI cannot substitute that.”

Cole Nichols places a McLaren 720S transmission again collectively at McPherson Faculty in McPherson, Kansas, on Oct. 15, 2025. (FOX Enterprise Community / Fox Information)

In fact, AI can’t substitute hands-on labor, nevertheless it’s additionally onerous to search out solutions on-line, as a result of most of the manuals haven’t been digitized. If that you must know learn how to rebuild a uncommon European engine, you’ll must be a scholar and head to McPherson’s library and skim the bodily guide.

“We’re engaged on the engine mission or no matter. They usually’ll ask me, ‘Effectively, what of this torque or what are these specs?’ I am like, ‘I do not know. Look it up.’ And they also get their telephone out. I am going, ‘no, no. You look it up within the guide, look it up in a e-book,’” stated Goodwin. “These vehicles are considered one of a sort.”

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There are at present 23 vehicles being labored on inside the school in the mean time, in numerous levels of restoration, from an ultra-rare 1956 Austin-Healey 100M Le Mans to a 1953 Mercedes-Benz 300S Cabriolet to a 1967 Mini Cooper S. After vehicles are accomplished, some are offered (with the proceeds going proper again into this system), whereas others be part of the college’s secure of basic vehicles that tour the nation in reveals and parades.

McPherson Faculty’s 1953 Mercedes-Benz 300 S Cabriolet on the Pebble Seaside Concours d’Class in Pebble Seaside, California, on Aug. 20, 2022. (David Paul Morris/Bloomberg through Getty Pictures / Getty Pictures)

Wanting forward, the college of automotive research hopes to double in measurement within the subsequent decade. Gutierrez says it is going to be increasing services to accommodate the anticipated progress, in addition to including new specialised applications in fields like automotive digital media and engineering.

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And whereas the cash may be good, and the job safety appears to be secure, for the scholars at McPherson, it’s about ardour.

“You gotta do it for the love. However it’s a reputable solution to make a residing, and you are not going to starve, and that job goes to be secure for a very long time, particularly when you’re good at it,” stated Goodwin. “I’ve at all times been in a position to feed my household.”