Throughout a presidential election cycle that’s concerned little speak of upper ed, apprenticeships have claimed an uncommon share of the highlight.
Vice President Kamala Harris not too long ago posted on X that she plans to double the variety of registered, or federally acknowledged, apprenticeships, if she is elected president. The Democratic nominee additionally instructed a crowd at a September rally in Pennsylvania that “our nation wants to acknowledge the worth of different paths, further paths, resembling apprenticeships and technical packages.”
The 2024 Democratic Social gathering platform, in the meantime, boasts “report investments” in registered apprenticeships below the Biden administration, with 1,000,000 trainees collaborating in them consequently. “That’s a path to the center class that households can depend on,” the platform reads.
Republicans are additionally bringing apprenticeships to the fore. These packages make a notable look in Mission 2025, the controversial blueprint for a second Trump administration from the Heritage Basis, a conservative suppose tank. The plan requires a return to a prior Trump administration coverage to have a system of industry-recognized apprenticeships, separate from registered apprenticeships, to skirt what Republicans view as an excessive amount of federal regulation. Registered apprenticeships have to satisfy sure high quality requirements as a way to be eligible for federal cash.
Heritage president Kevin Roberts wrote within the blueprint’s foreword that apprenticeships are an academic different to the “woke-dominated system of public colleges and universities.”
So, apprenticeships are clearly on the minds of politicians and thought leaders this election season. However what are they, precisely? Why is everyone speaking about them? And what does their present place within the nationwide discourse imply for increased ed?
Learn on.
How Do Apprenticeships Work?
Apprenticeships are on-the-job coaching packages the place trainees are working below the auspices of a mentor of their area and embrace classroom-based instruction. These packages are sometimes in trades like development, carpentry and plumbing but additionally exist in different fields like well being care.
The expectation constructed into these packages is that individuals are employed as trainees and have everlasting jobs ready for them on the opposite facet of their apprenticeship. Apprentices are paid, beginning at decrease wages than full staff, however their compensation ramps up as they achieve new abilities.
“Apprenticeships are the gold commonplace of workforce schooling— all the time have been and sure all the time will probably be,” mentioned Shalin Jyotishi, founder and managing director of the Way forward for Work & Innovation Economic system Initiative at New America, a left-leaning suppose tank. “And the rationale for that’s as a result of it’s the closest attainable hyperlink between the academic expertise and the employers within the work atmosphere.”
There are totally different “flavors” of apprenticeships, mentioned John Colborn, government director of Apprenticeships for America, a nonprofit searching for to develop apprenticeships in the US. Some apprenticeship packages are sponsored by particular person employers, whereas others stem from partnerships between employers and unions, amongst different kinds of preparations. Group faculties and different increased ed establishments also can provide school credit score for apprenticeships or sponsor apprenticeships by partnering with employers and overseeing the work-based studying and instruction apprentices obtain.
The U.S. Division of Labor offers its stamp of approval to some apprenticeships, that are thought-about registered and have to satisfy high quality requirements, although the method can range by state. In 2022, there have been practically 27,000 registered apprenticeship packages, serving virtually 600,000 apprentices, in keeping with the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Unregistered apprenticeships, in distinction, haven’t gone by way of that course of to show they meet these requirements.
Is Apprenticeship a Bipartisan Situation?
Principally.
Over all, Democrats and Republicans agree apprenticeships are a sensible funding.
“Democrat, Republican—there’s plenty of curiosity on this thought,” Colborn mentioned. He described apprenticeships receiving a “steadily growing stage of consideration” below the final three presidential administrations.
“However as a result of we’re who we’re as a rustic and the place we’re politically, we’ve to search out issues we’re going to battle about,” Colborn quipped.
The dividing line is usually the registration course of. Republicans usually view the method as too gradual and arduous to be purposeful. Democrats see Republicans as attempting to face up packages with out correct high quality assurances to guard trainees.
These tensions are taking part in out within the present election cycle.
The Democratic Nationwide Committee, for instance, put out a discover final month accusing Mission 2025 of “assaults” on apprenticeship.
The submit describes the Heritage Basis’s proposal to revive Trump’s industry-recognized apprenticeships system as “anti-worker” and giving “massive companies the ability to take advantage of American staff and prioritize massive enterprise over on a regular basis People.”
Jason L. Riley, a senior fellow on the Manhattan Institute, a conservative suppose tank, criticized Harris’s plan to develop registered apprenticeships in a Wall Avenue Journal column. He claimed registered apprenticeships are too usually “managed by labor unions, which aren’t within the enterprise of slicing pink tape.” (He additionally critiqued Trump for not emphasizing apprenticeships sufficient this election cycle.)
Increasing apprenticeships is an thought “many Republicans help,” Riley wrote. “A four-year school diploma isn’t for everybody and shouldn’t be the one path to a middle-class life,” however Harris “isn’t in favor of increasing all apprenticeships.”
OK, however Why Is Everybody Speaking About Them Now?
All this speak about apprenticeships on the nationwide stage comes at a time when People are more and more questioning the worth of conventional diploma packages. Politicians are tapping into that rising sentiment.
Typically, “within the nationwide discourse and presidential race, you’ve seen a shift within the dialog” to the concept “{that a} school diploma isn’t the one pathway to a good-paying job” and “it may not be the correct match for everybody,” mentioned Curran McSwigan, senior financial coverage adviser at Third Means, a center-left suppose tank. There’s been some motion away from levels and towards skills-based hiring practices, together with at the least 16 states that now not require a level for many state jobs. She sees right this moment’s discourse on apprenticeships as part of that bigger shift.
Harris’s promise to double the variety of registered apprenticeships reveals she “understands that there are lots of people who really feel like they need to have the ability to obtain financial and monetary safety and perhaps are uncertain on sort of the pathways which might be out there to them,” McSwigan added.
Colborn agreed that nationwide discussions about apprenticeship are pushed by a “very bipartisan re-examination” of how People practice for careers and the bounds of the “school for all” public coverage strategy.
Towards that backdrop, apprenticeships come off as a reasonably candy deal to learners—and voters—leery of scholar mortgage debt and occupied with different job coaching choices, Jyotishi mentioned.
“You’re paid to undergo an apprenticeship program,” he famous. “You’re employed. You’ve gotten an employer report … You keep away from debt … There’s an urge for food for apprenticeships, as a result of apprenticeships work very well.”
What Does All This Imply for Increased Ed?
The nationwide highlight on apprenticeship packages suggests these packages are going to get pleasure from extra help sooner or later, whoever turns into the subsequent president. Increased ed and workforce specialists say faculties and universities ought to see it as a chance to get extra concerned within the apprenticeship system somewhat than as a competitor.
Jyotishi mentioned he’d wish to see extra faculties function apprenticeship sponsors.
“I feel some faculties can reel and recoil once they hear ‘alternate options’ and ‘nondegree pathways,’” he mentioned. However “they too could be a part of these alternate options. In some ways, they’ve,” he mentioned, noting many already provide certificates packages and different kinds of other choices.
Apprenticeships at increased ed establishments stay comparatively unusual. A new report from Apprenticeships for America discovered that 541 neighborhood and technical faculties have been registered apprenticeship sponsors as of 2023, however solely 208 of those establishments even have an energetic apprentice. Apprentices in these packages, about 15,500 trainees, signify solely about 3 p.c of apprentices over all.
“We’ve seen fairly vital development of neighborhood faculties as apprenticeship sponsors,” Colborn mentioned. “We nonetheless have an extended methods to go earlier than we’re seeing actual scale there.”
There are additionally diploma apprenticeships, which award school credit score for apprenticeship packages so trainees can construct towards levels. This mannequin is uncommon within the U.S. however choosing up steam. Tennessee’s schooling division began the primary registered instructing apprenticeship program within the nation two years in the past, permitting individuals to earn levels whereas getting paid to coach in lecture rooms.
“Quite a lot of instances, there could be this notion that it’s increased ed or apprenticeships,” McSwigan mentioned. “I feel that there’s this room as effectively for increased ed and the apprenticeship system to work collectively to help staff, versus being an either-or resolution.”
(This text has been up to date to right Shalin Jyotishi’s title at New America.)
