In the halls of the CTE center, the roaring of engines and the pervasive smell of gasoline linger throughout the building. At the helm of it is Skyler Dustin, the NUHS mechanics teacher.

But with the departure of Mr. Dustin during the middle of the spring semester, only the echoes of students’ footsteps can be heard throughout the CTE center

After three years of teaching, Mr. Dustin has decided to step down from teaching and go back to being a normal mechanic. “I put a few years into teaching to try it out,” Mr. Dustin said. “I was hoping to get the hang of it, but it just didn’t quite work out the way I hoped it to.”

When starting, Mr. Dustin said he did it to still be in the mechanics but have something a little easier on his body. But mainly, Mr. Dustin taught because he saw himself in the students and wanted to share his knowledge with them. “Being able to experience it with you guys and getting your guys’ thought process, that was the rewarding part.”

But eventually, the “culture shock” between mechanics and teaching set in. Mr. Dustin viewed the biggest change as becoming a supervisor of the shop, versus just working there. In addition to this, Mr. Dustin began feeling the pressure of organizing and planning weeks in advance of projects for the class to do, becoming a major stressor for him.

In the end, Mr. Dustin felt teaching wasn’t his thing, but rather it was the relationships with the students and staff members, like Mr. Nelson, that he liked most about the job.

Currently their is no replacement for Mr. Dustin, but rather just a long-term sub. This has caused fear among some of the students about who will hold up Mr. Dustin’s mantle.

“Who knows what’s going to happen in the future?” Gabriel Hernandez, NUHS student, said. “Hopefully they can find a new mechanics teacher because kids here really love mechanics.”