If I worked at Home Depot, could I volunteer to run the Saturday morning kids' workshop?

Question

On the first Saturday of the month, Home Depot always has an instructional workshop for children to attend, with their parents watching. The instructor (a Home Depot employee) provides materials and tools, and teaches children how to do various projects with them.

If I worked there, I would like to do such a workshop on electrical. I would provide the kids with some wire, plastic boxes, outlets, switches, and light sockets. They would each build their own circuit from the materials given. Each child would also get a circuit breaker, and have to install it into the panel that I would provide. Toward the end of the workshop, they would be instructed to wire their circuit to the breaker. I would connect a power cord to the main lugs of the panel, and plug it in. Each child would turn on their own breaker and demonstrate their newly-built circuit to their parents.

Would this be something the store would allow me to do if I worked there? I think it could be very inspiring to children, and they would want to become electricians when they grow up.

Answer 1

When I worked at Home Depot they were always looking for people to help run the kid's workshops because it was such a hectic, noisy affair. But the projects they worked on were kits provided by the corporate offices in Atlanta, not produced locally at each store.



For a while, Home Depot offered Ladies Woodworking Classes. After I ran the 8 week class on the corporate schedule, we had a series of independent workshops in our store where we built real projects, and it was all done on our own initiative. We set it up, decided on the projects, and still didn't allow men to mess up the program.



But that was a few years ago when the founders of the company were still in charge and Home Depot was a very different place and corporate culture than it is now. They stopped the emphasis on hiring people with experience in the building trades in favor of cheaper, less qualified sales associates and drastically cut the number of people on the floor, though it seems to be better now than it was for a while.



Could you volunteer to run the program you're describing? Maybe, but its very doubtful, for a number of reasons. Number one, I'm not sure you could get store, let alone corporate approval for such an endeavor. Home Depot is the number 2 retailer (second only to Walmart, which dwarfs it) on earth and as such is extremely cautious about any activity which opens it up to any potential liability issues. I'm also not sure how popular such a class would be, though you may be right and it would be a big hit. The store would have to provide all the materials, which would also be a tough sell in an extremely difficult economy. The kids woodworking workshops are mostly an excuse to get parents into the store and to help build brand loyalty, so even though it might be a valuable and worthwhile idea, I'm not sure you could convince local or corporate management. Ask an Assistant Store Manager at your local Home Depot what their thoughts are if you want a measure of their interest.

Answer 2

Because electricity is very dangerous, and while some kids may be responsible enough to know to follow rules and have responsible parents to keep an eye on them, there aren't many. And accidents happen. What if they had a workshop and then one of those kids goes home and tries to undo a light switch or something just because he thinks he can do it and he missed the part where your supposed to turn the breaker off? They have electricity classes in high school. They can wait until then.

Answer 3

If you're not a troll you must be insane, when them kids go home some might think that the switches they have at home might be something they should be messing with, are you for real?



Because your question is beyond belief. You can report me all you like, but you're dangerous to people's children and there'd be few who wouldn't agree.



OK just because you didn't hurt yourself, doesn't mean others won't and I stand by "you're dangerous to people's children"

Answer 4

One time National Grid looked at downed wires in the yard. You could ignore all the warnings about downed wires because it was windy and raining pretty hard for a long time. In the dark he walked right up to the downed wires and said, yeah you have to hire an electrician to fix these wires etc. I was right behind him.

Answer 5

Hell no. These are 5 year-olds who can barely drive a nail.

Answer 6

No , you can not do that.