Cool kids: Mechanical know-how earns teen scholarship

Seventeen-year-old Matt LaShaw is on his way to college, and he has no questions about how he will afford the tuition. A senior at Freeman High School, LaShaw recently won a full tuition scholarship to Wyoming Technical College where he will study diesel mechanics.

His award was earned after placing first in the regional and state levels at the Skills USA Auto Service State competition. This summer he will go on to compete in the National Skills USA competition in Kansas City.

LaShaw has been attending the Spokane Skills Center since he was a junior. The center provides instruction in health and human services communications and information technology, and manufacturing, trade and industry.

LaShaw has been enrolled in the latter in automotive services. “I’ve learned how to diagnose correctly and do things right,” he said. He said projects at the Skills Center helped prepare him for the competitions, which included repair work on engines.

LaShaw is no stranger to working hard and getting his hands dirty; he has been helping out at his father’s farm in Rockford for about five years, and he doesn’t mind the busy schedule because he sees it as preparation for the future. “Work, school, home, I love it that way,” he said. “That’s the way it’s going to be when I get older, and I have fun with what I do.”

LaShaw also takes on a role in leadership as the manager of both the basketball and football team at Freeman High School. He said everything he has learned has helped make him a better problem solver, and he wants his peers to know that, to him, “success isn’t always academic … It’s whatever you want it to be.”