Apprenticeship Week Is Coming

National Apprenticeship Week, the annual celebration of apprenticeship designed to showcase how apprenticeship expands and improves career pathways for both employees and employers, is coming in April.  The celebration takes place in all 50 states and in U.S. Territories to bring attention to both the need and benefit of apprenticeship programs.  The U.S. Department of Labor has been sponsoring the event since 2015 and reports that over 2 million people have participated over the years.

It’s a universal sentiment that increasing apprenticeship is a positive thing for the United States.  It provides people – in particular younger people – a great opportunity to create and grow a rewarding career.  The exodus of baby boomers from the skilled trades combined with the lack of young people going into them has also created a massive shortage of workers that will make it hard for the labor supply to keep up with the demand moving forward.  This is especially true in the ever-changing technological environment.  So employers and the economy at large are in need of more skilled workers.

Politics aside, the Trump Administration recognizes this and has made a push to highlight both the need for skilled workers and to increase the number of people going into apprenticeship programs.  Executive Orders like Preparing Americans for High Paying Skilled Trade Jobs of the Future, Advancing Artificial Intelligence in Education for American Youth, Restoring America’s Maritime Dominance, and Reinvigorating the Nuclear Industrial Base all put forward ideas about the role of apprenticeship to support the re-shoring of America’s industrial base and planning for the future impact technology will have on the country.  They are early returns, but there is some impact in the form of about 363,000 more people in apprenticeship programs over the last year.

There is still a long way to go on apprenticeship.  If MBCEA can get in on the ground level of the rebuild, there will be immense opportunity for our members and the metal building industry at large.  Consider doing something to participate in National Apprenticeship Week and getting involved in MBCEA’s efforts to build registered apprenticeship programs for metal building assembly.