Community colleges could play a larger role in helping state and local governments develop apprenticeships as public agencies struggle to fill jobs and prepare for a wave of retirements, according to a new report from Apprenticeships for America.
“Scaling Public Sector Apprenticeships Through Intermediaries: Lessons from Emerging Practice” looks at how outside organizations can help public employers develop and sustain registered apprenticeships. Those intermediaries can include community colleges, workforce development boards, unions, industry associations and other nonprofit and public organizations.
The need is significant. More than 23 million people work in federal, state and local government, according to the report. About 27% of state government employees and 26% of local government workers are age 55 or older.
At the same time, registered apprenticeships still account for only about 0.3% of the U.S. workforce.
Dec. 1: Register for AACC’s in-person half-day event in Washington, D.C., focused on apprenticeships.
The report notes that removing degree requirements from government jobs isn’t enough to ensure employers have qualified applicants. Apprenticeships can provide the training needed to make skills-based hiring work.
That’s where community colleges can fit in. They already provide much of the related technical instruction (RTI), particularly for apprenticeships in the building trades. As apprenticeship moves into new occupations, however, some colleges are taking on other roles, including serving as program sponsors and helping employers put programs together.
The State University of New York (SUNY) system offers one example. When a police department wanted to restart a registered apprenticeship program that had been inactive for years, SUNY helped update the occupational standards and curriculum. It also became the program’s apprenticeship sponsor and helped secure grant funding to offset instruction costs.
New occupations
Public-sector apprenticeships traditionally have been concentrated in the trades, utilities and public safety. That’s changing. The report points to apprenticeships in cybersecurity, accounting, finance, project management and other professional fields, opening opportunities for community colleges that already train students for those careers.
In Charlotte, North Carolina, a city workforce development team has created apprenticeship programs covering 20 registered occupations across eight departments. City departments largely use their existing training for related instruction, turning to community colleges when additional instruction is needed.
But many public agencies don’t have the staff or expertise to build apprenticeship programs on their own.
“One of the clearest lessons from this study is that public employers should not have to build apprenticeship programs alone,” the report says.
Intermediaries can take on much of the administrative work, from developing occupational standards and coordinating instruction to registering programs, training mentors and tracking apprentices’ progress. That allows government employers to focus more on training and mentoring workers on the job.
Start with the need
The report also warns against creating apprenticeships simply for the sake of having them. Instead, public employers should first look at where they are having trouble finding and keeping workers.
“Start with workforce needs, not apprenticeship,” the report says.
Maryland took that approach by examining vacancy data across state agencies and focusing its apprenticeship efforts on environmental health specialists and procurement specialists. One apprenticeship leader described those jobs as the “gold standard” for the model because “you can’t find them, so you have to grow them.”
That approach also fits squarely with the workforce role many community colleges already play: identifying local labor needs, working with employers and developing education and training around specific occupations.
Obstacles remain
Developing public-sector apprenticeships comes with some wrinkles not typically found in the private sector. Government agencies have annual budget cycles, changing political leadership, civil-service classifications, collective bargaining agreements and personnel systems that may not easily accommodate apprenticeships. Public agencies also generally can’t take advantage of apprenticeship tax credits available to private employers.
The report recommends developing shared apprenticeship infrastructure and group sponsorship arrangements so that every government agency doesn’t have to create its own system. It also calls for policies addressing apprentice classifications and wage progression, funding geared toward public employers and sustainable support for intermediary organizations.
