Yahoo Autos Ford Mustang donations highlight automotive education ecosystem
YPSILANTI, Mich. — Last week, Ford donated four Mustangs to local schools in Washtenaw County to serve their automotive education programs. Pioneer High School, Huron High School, South & West Washtenaw Consortium, and Washtenaw Community College each took delivery of a Mustang at an event at Gene Butman Ford in Ypsilanti, just a jog down the road from Ann Arbor. Students and teachers were at the event and were able to finally drive away in the cars they’d be using as learning tools.
When I first heard about the donation, I thought it could make for an interesting local news story that enthusiasts would appreciate. But it served as an education about an entire ecosystem between automakers, dealers and educational institutions that helps keep the industry moving forward. Those car donations — of which there have been almost 300 from Ford alone since September — help supply students with career skills and employers with an educated, up-to-date workforce.
First, the cars …
The four Mustangs donated were all of the 2023 model year: three GTs (one a convertible) and one EcoBoost. Some were originally ordered by customers, some were headed into dealer inventory. These four cars suffered flood damage during a storm last year while parked at a holding lot in New Boston, Michigan, waiting to be loaded onto a train. Ford Market Area Coordinator Michael McLean described it as “level two” flood damage, “which means the water came only about as high as the carpet.”
Kenneth Lewis II, who teaches Auto Shop at Pioneer High School in Ann Arbor (and who also happens to be my karate instructor, and who clued me into the fact that the donation was happening in the first place), talked about plans for the Mustang his school received. It’ll be used for teaching basic technical skills for newer vehicles, and more. “We’re hoping to eventually do some fundraiser car shows, and we already have some partners that are going to donate some parts to the car so we can upgrade them and make them part of our high school drag program.”
I didn’t witness any burnouts at the donation event, but there were plenty of smiles accompanied by revving engines.
The donation program
I talked to Tom Butman, General Manager of Gene Butman Ford, the dealership that served as the liaison between Ford and the schools receiving the cars. His dealership had been holding onto the cars since November, as Tom worked on titling issues and dealership technicians cleaned and serviced the cars to make them able to be titled, and thus donated. That included removing odors, fixing wiring issues and corrosion, battery replacement — one car needed a new starter — and ensuring there wouldn’t be any mold or mildew that would affect air quality. Even though the students could have benefitted from doing some of the repairs themselves, the vehicles needed to achieve a certain standard, especially for safety, to be titled for donation.
Michael McLean spoke to me about the cars, as well as Ford’s Automotive Career Exploration (ACE) program, which offers “factory-level training to students and instructors, and it’s the same training our technicians are doing.” The cars were donated as part of this program. McLean told me that Ford’s program used to about 20-30 cars a year, but has donated almost 300 vehicles since September 2023.
First, McLean’s team identifies candidates for donation, such as vehicles damaged in transit or could otherwise not be sold as new — in this case, flood damage. Then they work with dealerships who can “sponsor” the vehicles, taking on expenses for transit, repairs and cleaning, and generally preparing them for donation. In this case, Ford reached out to Tom Butman, with whom McLean has worked with for technician recruiting, in part because of Butman’s networks with local schools.
