Steve Lutton: Welcome, Linda. Happy National Apprenticeship Week. A shift back from National Apprenticeship Day last year to National Apprenticeship Week this year. We’re grateful that you are able to spend some time with us today and for you to share some of your experiences as it relates to apprenticeships within the community college system or systems. You’re doing some exciting work in this space currently and we hope to hear more about it in just a minute. You clearly have been thinking about this for quite some time. You directly engaged in the process of getting a community college system approved as a sponsor in your own right prior to the position you’re holding right now. We’re fortunate to have you carrying that experience and the excitement for apprenticeship forward in a new project that you’re working on and we want to hear more about that new project and the impacts and how you see apprenticeships fitting in or evolving in the community college space in the days and years to come. So, let’s start by having you share a bit about yourself and about ACCT and who you serve as an organization or what organizations you serve.
Linda Rhoads: Well, thank you, Steve. As you said, I’m Linda Rhoads and I’m a Senior Project Associate here at the Association of Community College Trustees. I’ll share a little bit about myself and then circle back about ACCT.
I have been with ACCT for three years and prior to that was with a community college in Maryland and in that role, I was responsible for developing and getting standards approved for new non-traditional occupations and that was a really exciting and interesting and nice opportunity for me to learn about apprenticeship and what it really looks like for a community college to become a sponsor in one of those non-traditional occupations. Prior to that, my work history has involved implementation of many grants from many different kinds of federal agencies as well as serving as a non-profit executive director and then I worked in the for-profit large corporate environment for 10 years as well. So, all of those experiences really brought me to the point where apprenticeship is sort of a natural fit to tie all those experiences in the corporate environment with a community college and then as a non-profit.
Steve: Could you share a little bit about who ACCT is and who they serve and what your mission is?
Linda: The Association of Community College Trustees is a membership organization and our members consist of trustees and presidents of community colleges across the United States and our primary function is lobbying and advocacy on behalf of those organizations, community colleges, and their students as well as we serve a role in providing technical assistance and resources and training to support trustees in their roles as community college trustees.
Within the Association of Community College Trustees is our Center for Policy and Practice which is where I’m housed and our apprenticeship project operates out of and our function is to serve as sort of a go-between between our membership and our policy team. So, we look for opportunities where we can help community colleges leverage new opportunities or unleveraged opportunities to better serve their students, provide new opportunities for their students to be more effective, and in that process we then learn from the community colleges about best practices and what’s working and what isn’t and that helps ACCT be better informed about new policies that may be needed or policy changes that would provide more support and allow community colleges to be more effective.
So, the apprenticeship project, as I said, is housed in our Center for Policy and Practice and we’re in our second of four years and we’re developing this project to provide resources, a series of training modules for community colleges to become sponsors of new apprenticeship programs, particularly in the non-traditional and emerging occupations.
Steve: Thank you. If you lean on your experience in your previous role at a community college and what you’re doing now, what do you feel the importance of community college is in Registered Apprenticeship in that space? Why is this important at this time?
Linda: Yeah, that’s a great question. Both of those are two different questions. So, community colleges are a perfect fit to serve as sponsors for Registered Apprenticeship programs. Community colleges have historically served as Related Instruction providers in many capacities for employers, for unions, all across the board. Community colleges also historically provide case management, student support services, financial aid. Community colleges operate and look for work-based learning programs where they place students in employment situations and internships. So, a Registered Apprenticeship program really just pulls all those pieces together in a nice package and gives the community college a framework to advance what they’re already doing just in a new context.
And to your question about particularly in this moment, there’s a trend in Registered Apprenticeship to move into these new non-traditional occupations that are not trades and not construction, but they’re occupations in healthcare, occupations in IT, advanced manufacturing, which in essence is high-tech nowadays, all kinds of aerospace occupations, cybersecurity. I mentioned healthcare, but also human services occupations. And community colleges are a great fit primarily because they’re already providing training, short-term programs, credentialing, certificates and certifications. And many of these occupations that are now being looked at as good opportunities to apply into an apprenticeship framework. So, we’re excited to be part of that.
Steve: I think the proximity of community colleges and the relationships they have to their local employers is incredibly unique and can’t really help but serve the employers in the region, which they’re already doing now. It really does make sense.
Linda: Yes, a lot of community colleges, if not most or all community colleges, have existing relationships with employers. They serve on the workforce boards. They’re engaged in the economic development profiles for their region. So, it’s a nice fit for them to then formalize these relationships in the way that an apprenticeship provides to create some structure and really move closer toward a goal of many community colleges to help students move into family living wage jobs and opportunities for career pathways.
Steve: Knowing what you know, again, about your own experience and what we are learning currently with the first cohort going through your training modules, what advice do you have for community colleges who are considering becoming a Registered Apprenticeship sponsor themselves? What considerations would they need to make?
Linda: Well, I think one piece that is really important that can be missed is that they want to take the process of developing standards for a particular occupation as tasks. And there’s a standardized format and there are resources to help community colleges do that, some of which will be provided by ACCT on our upcoming website.
But the bigger picture is that if community colleges are strategic about how they engage their employer partners, how they decide which occupations they’re going to pursue with an apprenticeship, they can think much more strategically about how they serve their region, their employers, the economic development of the region. Apprenticeships provide an opportunity for community colleges to have tools for better projecting enrollment. There are lots of advantages that are bigger picture and strategic that if community colleges are thinking about apprenticeship in that way, that’s a different mindset than thinking of apprenticeship as just another training program to help an employer retain an individual employee.
So I think my advice would be to be strategic about why they decide to pursue sponsorship and apprenticeship and think big picture about how to implement for the long term and not be too penny-pinching about whether or not this particular occupation is going to earn a certain number of enrollments right at the beginning. But think longer term about how this can benefit both the college and the whole region that they serve, as well as their students, of course.
Steve: It does require a bit of a paradigm shift and really a systems change approach, because many community colleges for years, to your point, have been, you know, it is about enrollment. It is about filling classes. And yes, they do have engagements with employers, regional employers, but thinking about it in the apprenticeship model and what that means for outcomes for their students, it does take a little bit of a mind shift to maybe where they’ve been used to operating out of.
I’d like you to talk for a minute about how colleges are thinking about apprenticeships overlaying current pathways that students can go down, whether it’s certificate, whether it’s associate, whether it’s even advanced degrees. What are colleges currently considering with regard to apprenticeships and or is that maybe a future, maybe is that down the road another few years before we start seeing that? I’m just curious what you’ve been exposed to and what colleges are telling you.
Linda: So the apprenticeship model, one of the things that I think struck me when I was enmeshed in the process of developing standards is the apprenticeship model looks to be quite rigid and simplistic from the outside until you start to develop a new program and you discover that there is a lot of flexibility within the framework. There are a lot of nuances and there are a lot of different approaches for how you develop the standards that define the related instruction, the competencies and how you’re going to structure what it is you want the students to accomplish.
And so the apprenticeship model, having said that about its flexibility, provides a lot of opportunity to look at whether a student is looking for a short-term solution, medium-term, if they are interested in the longer-term pathway to get an associate’s degree and then on to a four-year degree. And I think you asked about both the present and the future. There are colleges who are currently designing short-term certificate apprenticeship programs with the concept of scaffolding, thinking about how they can build on the short-term apprenticeship program, how they can add credentials and develop the next level of apprenticeship. There are colleges exploring how an apprenticeship either will encompass an associate’s degree fully or prepare a student to then pursue an associate’s degree and how you navigate the needs of an employer with those two things in mind. So I think that the apprenticeship model is timely because, of course, we’re finding for its common knowledge that there are a lot of jobs and a lot of employment opportunities that don’t require four-year degrees, that are good jobs with career pathways and good salaries. And the apprenticeship model offers a way for students to accomplish that without taking on debt as they pursue their employment solution through an apprenticeship.
Steve: It’s the guaranteed job piece, too, in my mind. Typically, when the college is making that commitment to the apprenticeship model, they’ve got an employer who is guaranteeing people jobs.
Linda: Another really important element is that we have seen that there are certain populations of students who are far more successful when they are given an opportunity to accomplish milestones such as short-term certificates and then can continue to pursue. So the apprenticeship model really fits nicely into that need to provide an opportunity for students who may not have experience in higher education and may not be accustomed to a long-term commitment for educational purposes. The students are able to earn the short-term certifications, they’re able to be employed right away. Some research that shows a lot of students think of themselves as workers first and students second, and that can result in students having to make a choice to pursue a job opportunity or they need to go to work instead of choosing to go to school. So the apprenticeship model creates a framework where they are receiving support from both their employer and the sponsor, in this case the community college, to pursue both and not have to choose between whether they need to go to work or whether they need to go to school because there are wraparound supports to help them balance those commitments and carry out the responsibilities that they have to fulfill the requirements for their apprenticeship.
Steve: Really, really well said. Someone told me once that the traditional model is you get educated to become employed and the apprenticeship model is you become employed and then become educated for the role. It’s a little bit of a shift, but I think what you described is completely accurate.
What we’re seeing a little bit of are colleges which are embedding the apprenticeship training or a certificate as a credit-bearing mechanism that meets the apprenticeship needs but also translates into credit towards an associate degree. So they’re allowing that early education, it’s going to have multiple on-ramps and multiple off-ramps to advanced education, some post-secondary education, and it allows people that want to pursue an associate degree a more economical way to do it.
And also, colleges are leveraging employer 50-50 models to allow the employer-funding piece to help the individual pursue their associate degree after they’ve completed the apprenticeship component.
So really exciting changes and models and considerations for someone pursuing a degree affordably, right?
I’m curious if you could speak for a moment also about how community colleges are leveraging their employer engagement to solve specific workforce development problems in a community. Could be for the employer specifically, but it could be more broadly for a community that has a certain workforce challenge that they’re trying to solve. How is it that the community colleges can leverage the apprenticeship model to do that?
Linda: Well, community colleges have a lot of experience in providing the kinds of training that employers need in sort of a just-in-time model. So the apprenticeship framework is really just another option for community colleges to offer to those employers. Most of the colleges in our current cohort, I think through, nearly all of them are working on at least one of their new apprenticeship occupations in an area where an employer specifically has expressed a need. So many community colleges already have processes in place to conduct needs assessments and to really help the employer articulate what the occupation needs are, what their occupation needs might be for the future. So apprenticeship just becomes part of the menu that community colleges can offer employers. And as I’m sure you know, Steve, and many of the viewers might know that there is a much higher employment retention rate when an individual has been an apprentice. And so that’s appealing to employers to have a program offered by a community college that has a much higher likelihood of an employee being retained and longer-term commitment to staying with that particular employer. And likewise, that’s beneficial for the students, of course. If they’re not in an apprenticeship they wind up having to pay for their own education, the tuition and fees, and then they could wind up not finding or having difficulty finding a job. So the apprenticeship model really offers a lot of stability, if you will, as employers are committed to carrying out their role in helping a student accomplish the full apprenticeship.
Steve: I want to go back and talk a little bit about degreed apprenticeships. It’s being talked about more and more in apprenticeships in general. I know there’s conversations at the national level about degreed apprenticeships. There’s international discussions and some practices that have been ongoing for a period of time. Do you see degreed apprenticeships as a separate path, a new path, something that really is already in place and we don’t call it a degreed apprenticeship? Where do you think we are today? And if you think it’s going to evolve, where do you see degreed apprenticeships evolving?
Linda: I think that’s a really good question. My thoughts and comments on this might be counter to other views. The way I see this question is that whether an apprenticeship leads to a degree or includes a degree is really just one of the many nuances that a community college needs to explore with their employer partners and what the long-term goals are. As the process is underway to determine what the courses are that should be included as related instruction should encompass the question of whether that student will need a degree, whether the employer wants their employees to have degrees.
And one advantage for the student, or for the apprentice, when the community college is the sponsor is that the community college also has the responsibility to advocate for what is going to be the best thing for the student. So with the goal and the requirement that an apprenticeship is transferable to other employers in the same occupation, if a degree is required for a particular occupation, then it should be included in the apprenticeship. But as far as the actual mechanics of creating an apprenticeship that has a degree from a community college perspective, it’s just a matter of which courses you select and how you frame any additional extracurricular or additional courses that a student might take that are electives.
I frankly don’t see the question of whether an apprenticeship is a degree or non-degree as being a big challenge or a big issue. It’s mostly just a matter of making sure that when you are designing a Registered Apprenticeship program, you are exploring all of the options of what is going to be in the best interest for the student to meet the requirements of an apprenticeship being transferable, the needs of the employer. And if a degree is not the best pathway, how do you set up a scaffolded approach, as I mentioned earlier, or how do you create a series of opportunities so that the student can still build on the courses they’ve taken? For example, if you want them to be sure and have that opportunity, how do you give them credit for the courses they’ve taken in an apprenticeship, whether or not the apprenticeship encompasses a degree or not? So I think it’s an important question, but I think that it’s really a question that just becomes part of the design process and how you determine what is going to be included in the apprenticeship, particularly in the standards section where you declare which certifications and what are the credentials that an individual will earn. That’s where I think that conversation needs to take place.
Steve: This is really early, Linda, so if you don’t have a point of reference, that’s fine. Do you see any conversations starting to happen around the Pell, the apprenticeship Pell funding?
Linda: With regard to the new Workforce Pell opportunity, community colleges are, of course, looking ahead at what is to come and how to implement that. And community colleges are currently exploring what the legislation will require, what kinds of documentation, and I think that Workforce Pell can support students, particularly in apprenticeship, when in the short term they meet those requirements for Workforce Pell. But we’re kind of early on in the process, and a lot of the state governors’ teams are still in the process of developing what their programs are going to look like, how they’re going to unfold, and at ACCT, we’re working on developing some projects to support community colleges and working with the governors’ offices around the implementation of Workforce Pell and what that can look like. And, of course, Registered Apprenticeship will be a part of that conversation in how Workforce Pell can be applied.
Steve: I think that’s exactly right. I think it is early. I think there are some gray areas which will need to be ironed out. And I think you’re right, the moving it to the state’s governor’s office to define what are the priority occupations and what can be funded is, it’s going to look different in every state to some degree. It has to look different in every state, and it’s still a work in progress.
So I’d like to wrap up just with one final question. You and I have been working together now for, well, off and on actually, probably close to two years, two and a half years now, but more directly this past year on this project for rolling out apprenticeship models and getting colleges to be sponsors. But can you think of anything that changed once you started working with JobForward on this project?
Linda: Yeah, absolutely. And I’d also like to say a comment that has some substance but also acknowledge the organization that’s providing our funding is Ascendium. And one of the great things about our relationship with Ascendium is their recognition of the importance of the relationship between the community colleges and their employer partners. We’ve learned, my colleagues and I here at ACCT over the years of various employment situations, that one of the main challenges with community colleges becoming sponsors is gaining that long-term commitment from employers. Ascendium has been a great partner in recognizing that that’s an important focus for us to move forward. In addition, our funder Ascendium included in our budget the opportunity for us to work with you, Steve, and your team at JobForward. And it has been an absolute pleasure among many other things, but having your team and you develop a lot of the written materials and the planning guides has been a great asset that has really helped us move this project forward. The project will consist of, I believe, we’re at about 18 or 19 planning guides, and they’re each focused on very narrowly defined topics that will be kind of how-to instructions for community colleges. And the expertise that JobForward has brought is just invaluable for what we’ve been able to accomplish in this particular project. We look forward to continuing our work together.
Steve: Well, thank you. It’s been, it really has been a pleasure and enjoyed working with the 10 colleges and you and your staff. It’s been a delight. Looking forward to seeing what the second cohort brings and it’ll be all new and be exciting.
Well, I want to thank you, Linda, for taking the time to meet with me and happy National Apprenticeship Week. And yes, and I’m looking forward to continuing working together.
Linda: Thank you, Steve. It’s been a pleasure.