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Model Career Programs Set Kentucky Apart as Apprenticeship Ambassador
By Abeer Sikder, Senior Policy Analyst
In recent years, Kentucky has established innovative Registered Apprenticeship programs to help high school students transition smoothly into the workforce. Integral to this transition are individuals like Mary Taylor, a dedicated industry training and development specialist with the Kentucky Office of Career and Technical Education, who has helped drive the expansion of such programs in the Commonwealth to many new industries, including early childhood services, teaching, and information technology.
Taylor’s journey into her current role began in adult education, where she worked as a career advisor at a technical center. She later joined the Kentucky Department of Education as a workforce liaison, where her experience inspired her to develop Registered Apprenticeship programs, or RAPs, that now impact technical education in the state.
RAPs are a proven apprenticeship model validated by the U.S. Department of Labor and/or state apprenticeship agency that results in nationally recognized portable credentials.
“My job was to help [students] transition … and to know what students were doing after high school,” Taylor said. “I saw that we were failing not only students, but local industry because we did not have a better, more accelerated clear path for them post-secondarily.”
Through her non-traditional career path, Taylor has become a pivotal figure in bridging the gap between education and employment for high school students, ensuring them access to valuable career pathways that don’t necessarily involve the traditional route of college.
The Apprenticeship Ambassador Initiative
In 2022, the Kentucky Department of Education’s Office of Career and Technical Education was among the inaugural selections of the U.S. Department of Labor’s Apprenticeship Ambassador Initiative. “This designation recognizes Kentucky as a national leader in Registered Apprenticeships and opens more doors for our young people to train while in high school for a career that can provide them with a prosperous livelihood,” said Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear in a statement. The DOL created the Apprenticeship Ambassador Initiative to establish a “national network of employers, labor organizations, industry associations, program sponsors, educators, workforce intermediaries, minority-serving institutions, community-based organizations, and other stakeholders to serve as champions for expanding and diversifying Registered Apprenticeship.”
States, agencies and organizations can learn more about who can become an Apprenticeship Ambassador at the ApprenticeshipUSA website. |
Soon after starting at the Department of Education, Taylor noticed gaps around technical education for students and an overemphasis on college as the only “next step” after high school. She realized parents and guardians often overlooked RAP benefits, insisting students must go to college to be successful.
Taylor not only took on the challenge of educating parents about the benefits of registered apprenticeships, but teachers and schools as well.
“Educators know about education — they were in school for 12 years, [then went] to college, [and then returned] to the classroom,” Taylor said. “This [apprenticeship model] is a very nontraditional path for them … as apprenticeships have been for the trades and unions, and there were misconceptions about it.”
What is an apprenticeship?
Apprenticeships are high quality employment pathways offering paid work experience, classroom instruction, skill development, career advancement and more. For workers, these programs provide valuable opportunities to increase wages with little to no educational debt, while employers receive an opportunity to effectively recruit, retain and train workers with the necessary skills for growing industries.
Despite initial resistance, Taylor was able to break through. Beginning with skilled trades, an area successfully practicing apprenticeship for decades, she and her team in Kentucky expanded the state’s youth apprenticeship opportunities as more employers began seeing the potential in the youth age group as a sustainable, untapped workforce.
Taylor has since seen more students, parents and teachers change their entire perspective of apprenticeship. Research supports her observations, revealing youth are more likely to view apprenticeship pathways positively when they are exposed to these opportunities in high school and receive family support.
Kentucky’s Model of Youth Apprenticeship
Kentucky offers multiple pathways for youth transition to the workforce. Among them are youth apprenticeships. These RAPs, designed for youth aged 16-24, allow students to work for an employer while receiving credit hours for prior learning, streamlining them into a post-apprenticeship opportunity. Youth apprenticeships can lead to students enrolling in college, finding full-time employment, or both.
Kentucky’s youth apprenticeship model requires students, while in high school, to be in a career technical education course corresponding to their apprenticeship program. For example, health care apprenticeship students must take health care career and technical education courses.
Students must take two career and technical education courses in their field to be eligible for interviews with employers who may take them on as apprentices in a cooperative education placement, or a co-op.
“A co-op is a paid, work-based learning opportunity where [students] are getting apprenticeship hours,” Taylor said. “Those hours will count toward the apprenticeship … and once they graduate [from the co-op], they can just continue on as a full-time registered apprentice.”
Youth apprenticeships often begin in high school, but typically finish after graduation (depending on the required hours). In other states, like Colorado, apprenticeship intermediaries work with employers, schools and businesses to develop new youth apprenticeship pathways.
Kentucky’s Model of Pre-Apprenticeship
In addition to youth apprenticeships, Kentucky offers pre-apprenticeships, allowing students to prepare for application to Registered Apprenticeship programs post-graduation. The employer or training provider can choose to give students credit towards their apprenticeship for coursework they have completed while in high school.
Rather than taking part in on-the-job learning, Taylor said, “students are going to have classroom instruction with ‘lab instruction’ that includes a technical component on assessments.”
As part of pre-apprenticeships in Kentucky, students take four courses and a test to receive a nationally recognized certificate through Tech Ready Apprentices for Careers in Kentucky, otherwise known as TRACK.
TRACK, a collaboration between the Kentucky Department of Education’s Office of Career and Technical Education and the Kentucky Office of Apprenticeship, offers high school students with career pathway opportunities into various RAPs. The program is both a business and industry driven RAP, rooted in technical and professional skills for students.
“The Office of Employer and Apprenticeship Services issues a [nationally recognized] certificate for students who complete the TRACK program that is recognized by the industry as credit for prior learning, and by the Kentucky Department of Education as completion of a career pathway,” Taylor said.
The premise of TRACK is that students do NOT have to choose between education and a career. TRACK’s model specifies roles for state offices, employers, schools and students.
Taylor noted that classroom instruction is one of the best benefits of the TRACK model. As part of it, students take high school courses relating to an apprenticeship in a specific industry for a particular employer who wants to hire them, rather than waiting years to get industry and job training that is paid by the employer.
“Kentucky is fortunate to have a youth apprenticeship program that is recognized as a national model by both the U.S. Department of Labor and the Department of Education,” said Kentucky Lt. Gov. Jacqueline Coleman. “TRACK has provided education and training to hundreds of high school students who are enrolled in career and technical education programs, as well as providing a pipeline to employers from a wide range of industries.”
Financial Support for Apprenticeships
In 1998, the Kentucky General Assembly created the Kentucky Educational Excellence Scholarship, known as KEES for short. The KEES program provides scholarships toward college or technical school for Kentucky students who earn a grade point average of 2.5 or higher during each year of high school.
Taylor, who advocated for apprenticeship financial support, worked with legislators and the Kentucky Higher Education Assistance Authority to pass a bill allowing KEES funds to support RAPs.
As a result of this legislative victory, students can use KEES money for tools, tuition, licensure, uniforms, equipment and travel related to their apprenticeships with a receipt highlighting its support for their program.
Taylor noted that students who are normally disinterested in KEES, due to having no plans to pursue a postsecondary education, have shown increased interest in the scholarship because it can instead go toward an apprenticeship.
“It’s creating an awareness of the benefits of apprenticeship for parents and educators, and it’s demonstrating to employers that we in K-12 education are very serious about getting students into apprenticeship programs,” Taylor said.
Other states, like Kansas, offer scholarships, grant funds and tax credits to student apprenticeship in postsecondary education. The Georgia HOPE Career Grant and the Idaho State Board of Education provide scholarships and grants that students can allocate toward apprenticeships.
Apprenticeship as a Workforce Remedy
New, innovative RAPs for high school students benefit local and state economies, and address workforce shortages and transaction costs for employers.
“Anybody that’s having a workforce crisis needs to look to apprenticeship as a model because of the ‘grow your own as you learn’ model,” Taylor said. “Instead of an employer having to recruit from out of state, hire a headhunter [and] pay relocation costs, they’re [employers] working with the local high school down the street, or students that more than likely want to stay in that area anyway for a job … and avoid college debt.”
At the postsecondary level, more than 80 RAPS are available through the Kentucky Community and Technical College System, with apprenticeship coordinators at each college campus to help build and implement customized programs.
Like Kentucky, other states are developing new, innovative models for youth apprenticeships. Among them are California, Indiana and Utah, where governors have seized their opportunity to improve and strengthen state education and workforce systems through youth apprenticeship.
“Today’s high school students are tomorrow’s workforce,” said North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper in his statement for National Apprenticeship Week 2023. “Youth apprenticeship programs … provide students with an opportunity to learn valuable skills while getting on-the-job training.”