Alek McElroy, a 17-year-old student who helps build sets for theater productions at Lawrence High School, isn’t asking for much.

He said he’d settle for some power drills that consistently worked. Or complete ratchet sets. They don’t even have to be new.

“We just have so few tools to begin with,” said McElroy, who is entering his senior year at LHS. “The ones we do have are in bad need of repair or really just need to be replaced.”

McElroy hopes to replace the tools through a tool drive planned Saturday and Sunday at three Lawrence grocery stores.

Getting better tools has become a mission for McElroy. By doing it, he said he hoped to improve working conditions for himself and fellow students and at the same time earn Eagle Scout status.

“We need to safely be able to build the sets and to do that we need decent tools,” he said. But with money tight for any school program, no one is expecting help for the theater program.

LHS teacher Kim O’Brien, who directs drama productions at the school, said she was surprised when McElroy approached her about having a tool drive.

“I about fell over,” O’Brien said.

O’Brien said she always spoke with students about taking ownership in things and having pride in their work. But it’s been somewhat difficult to persuade most of them.

The department is pretty self-sufficient, O’Brien said. But there aren’t a lot of extra dollars in the budget for the purchase new equipment and tools.

“So it comes back to it being a money issue,” she said. “It’s not easy to maintain and replace tools.”

Some tools have disappeared through the years, she said. What’s left in the scene shop is mainly old and worn out. At one point, O’Brien said she decided to get rid of everything broken. That left the scene shop pretty much empty. Even now, O’Brien said there were power drills that ought to be thrown out.

“But we don’t do it because then we’d have nothing,” she said.

McElroy said he had no estimate for how many tools the program would get through the drive.

“But any is better than zero because we don’t have much right now,” he said.