Mike Rowe

The Naked Truth

Question: If I were to form “The American Idol Scholarship Fund” and announce $15,000 of professional training for anyone who wished to become a pop star, how long do you think it would take to give away a million dollars?

A day? An hour? A minute?

What if I offered the same money to anyone who wanted to learn how to maintain and repair diesel engines? How fast would the million dollars go then?

Currently, this question has no official answer. But I can tell you this – for the last month, mikeroweWORKS has been offering FULL-RIDE scholarships to one of the best trade schools in the country. And as of now – a big chunk of that million dollars is still up for grabs. Why? Because mikeroweWORKS scholarships do not reward fame or celebrity. They reward work ethic, and the willingness to learn a necessary skill. In other words, they are designed to train people for jobs that actually exist.

Last month, I shot a few commercials to announce my latest partnership with Universal Technical Institute As you may know, UTI trains the technicians that keep America’s trucks on the road. Not as sexy perhaps as the next American Idol, but a great place to find a few American Icons. Truth is, our Trade Schools play an important role in maintaining this thing we call “civilization,” and given the preponderance of Help Wanted signs currently papering our transportation industry, I wanted to help draw some attention to another specific career that too many people simply overlook.

Anyway, this particular commercial didn’t make it past Standards and Practices, for obvious reasons. But since I’m the only censor in these parts, I’ve made it available here, for the refined taste and sophisticated worldview of my 835,000 closest friends. (Warning – Partial Nudity and Poor Judgment abound.)

Mike

PS. As long as you’re loafing around on the interweb, do me a favor. If you or someone you know are willing to explore a career in the transportation industry, I’d seriously like to help. The opportunities are real, and the details about this particular program – along with a more tasteful version of the above message – can be found here. 

PPS. By traditional standards, this scholarship program is working just fine. I’m just personally appalled that the money didn’t vanish in the first twenty minutes. (I’ll work on my expectations.)

PPPS I know. The diet starts tomorrow.

If you don’t qualify for the mrW/UTI scholarship you should check out the mikeroweWORKS Foundation Work Ethic Scholarship. This scholarship is being offered through our partner Scholarship  America, and it can be used at any qualifying institution, including UTI, TWS, RSI and other qualifying trade schools around the country.

This video is not authorized or approved by UTI. Or for that matter, by anyone.

Click here to watch on YouTube.