Wired for a bright future

PLAINS TWP. – Ryan Gorski got a tool belt for Christmas when he was 10.

Not one with those colorful plastic hammers and screwdrivers, a real one, with real tools. And he really used them … to do real work. His favorite task: electrical wiring.

“I just got into it,” Gorski, 18, said, “My dad and uncle and grandfather are all electricians.”

Knowing that history may help explain how Gorski won first place for residential wiring in the state SkillsUSA championships, a competition among career and technical students. The Holy Redeemer High School senior is headed for the national championships in Kansas City, Mo., June 25 and 26.

“I can’t stress enough what a quality kid this guy is,” said Robert Bartoni, the SkillsUSA team coordinator at Wilkes-Barre Area Vo-Tech, where Gorski practices his future trade.

“Practice” may be the wrong word these days. Gorski works on real-world stuff at the school. Bartoni said he installed wiring when a former storage room was turned into a shop.

Gorski is also a bit beyond what the school teaches. While he officially learns copper wiring for telecommunications, he has handled optical fiber outside the school. His dad maintains telecommunications at Blue Cross. He also does other electrical work outside that job.

“I’ve worked with my dad since I was 10 years old,” Gorski said. “I watched at first, then started helping.”

Despite all the success and praise, Gorski is soft-spoken and he soft-pedals his achievements. He plans to become an electrician apprentice and work his way into the union. International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 163 training director John Nadolny said that entails five years being mentored by a journeyman while attending school two nights a week. After that, he could become a journeyman himself.

“The places he could go are pretty unlimited,” Nadolny said, adding that, depending on the job and location, his starting salary could be as high as $60,000.

So, with eight years of electrical work before high school graduation, has he ever almost electrocuted himself? “Oh yeah, not too long ago,” Gorski says casually, as if he had bumped into an old friend rather than 110 volts. “I was working on something, my dad said the power was off, but I didn’t check it.”

There you go. Still a teen and he’s been around electricity so long that even getting shocked is no shock.

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