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WSJ Article Asks "Why Are Apprenticeships in Decline?"

An Apr. 27, 2014, article in the Wall Street Journal poses the following question: Apprenticeships Help Close the Skills Gap. So Why Are They in Decline?

Here's an excerpt from the article:

Ask CEOs and corporate recruiters whether they're finding the workers they need and they'll lament about a skills gap that threatens productivity and growth—not just in their companies but in the economy at large.
Yet employers and state legislators have been decidedly lukewarm about a proven solution to the problem: apprenticeships.

Apprenticeships can offer a precise match between the skills employers want and the training workers receive, says Robert Lerman, an economics professor at American University.

"It's a great model for transferring skills from one generation to the next," says John Ladd, director of the Department of Labor's Office of Apprenticeship.

Nevertheless, according to the Labor Department, formal programs that combine on-the-job learning with mentorships and classroom education fell 40% in the U.S. between 2003 and 2013.
All of which leads to the question: If apprenticeships are the solution to a pressing problem, why is there so much resistance?

To read the full article, click here. (WSJ subscription may be required)

WSJ Op Ed Calls for Reinvigoration of "Shop Class" Education Offerings

An April 24 opinion column written by Ohio Treasurer Josh Mandel calls for a reinvestment and focus on career and technical education. The article is titled "Welders Make $150,000? Bring Back Shop Class" and subtitled "Taking pride in learning to make and build things can begin in high school. Plenty of jobs await."

Mr. Mandel states:

Too many young people have four-year liberal-arts degrees, are thousands of dollars in debt and find themselves serving coffee at Starbucks or working part-time at the mall. Many of them would have been better off with a two-year skilled-trade or technical education that provides the skills to secure a well-paying job.

Visit The Wall Street Journal website to read the complete article. (Subscription may be required.)

Mike Rowe Interview

"If we are lending money that ostensibly we don't have to kids who have no hope of making it back in order to train them for jobs that clearly don't exist, I might suggest that we've gone around the bend a little bit," says TV personality Mike Rowe, best known as the longtime host of Discovery Channel's Dirty Jobs.

"There is a real disconnect in the way that we educate vis-a-vis the opportunities that are available. You have - right now - about 3 million jobs that can't be filled," he says, talking about openings in traditional trades ranging from construction to welding to plumbing. "Jobs that typically parents' don't sit down with their kids and say, 'Look, if all goes well, this is what you are going to do.'"

Rowe, who once sang for the Baltimore Opera and worked as an on-air pitchman for QVC, worries that traditional K-12 education demonizes blue-collar fields that pay well and are begging for workers while insisting that everyone get a college degree. He stresses that he's "got nothing against college" but believes it's a huge mistake to push everyone in the same direction regardless of interest or ability. Between Mike Rowe Foundation and Profoundly Disconnected, a venture between Rowe and the heavy equipment manufacturer Caterpillar, Rowe is hoping both to help people find new careers and publicize what he calls "the diploma dilemma."

Rowe recently sat down with Reason TV's Nick Gillespie to discuss his bad experience with a high school guidance counselor (3:20), why he provides scholarships based on work ethic (6:57), the problem with taxpayer-supported college loans (8:40), why America demonizes dirty jobs (11:32), the happiest day of his life (13:14), why following your passion is terrible advice (17:05), why it's so hard to hire good people (21:04), the hidden cost of regulatory compliance (23:16), the problem with Obama's promise to create shovel ready jobs (33:05), efficiency versus effectiveness (34:17), and life after Dirty Jobs (38:24).

You can check out the entire 41-minute-long interview here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qzKzu86Agg0. Visit http://reason.com/reasontv/2013/12/13... for full text, links, and downloadable versions of the video.

Moneynews: College Degree No Longer the Solution to Good Jobs

Moneynews article: College Degree No Longer the Solution to Good Jobs

Thursday, January 23, 2014 06:54 AM

By: Neal Asbury

More than 40 percent of recent U.S. college graduates are unemployed, underemployed or need more training to get on a career track, according to a poll released last year by global management consulting firm Accenture.

The online survey of 1,050 workers who finished school in the previous two years and 1,010 who received their degree in 2013 also found that many graduates, some heavily in debt because of the cost of their education, say they are in jobs that do not require a college degree. In fact, just 53 percent of the graduates found full-time jobs in their field of study.

[Check out the rest of the article at Moneynews.]

Bloomberg article concludes apprenticeships offer a path to higher pay for women

A March 26 Bloomberg.com article focuses on the fact that apprenticeship offers a great path to higher wages for women.

The article notes that "Women ages 16 and older comprise 53.6 percent of the U.S. labor force, yet in 2012 made up about 64 percent of minimum-wage workers, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics."

The article also cites a July 2012 Labor Department by Princeton, New Jersey-based Mathematica Policy Research study of registered apprentices in 10 states which showed that in the sixth year after enrollment women made $2,615 more annually than nonparticipants.

Read the entire article at Bloomberg.com!

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Moneynews article: College Degree No Longer the Solution to Good Jobs

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