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Career education is a vital pipeline to high demand jobs in the workforce. Students from all walks of life benefit from the opportunity to pursue their career education goals and find new employment opportunities. Join Dr. Jason Altmire, President and CEO of Career Education Colleges and Universities (CECU), as he discusses the issues and innovations affecting postsecondary career education. Twice monthly, he and his guests discuss politics, business, and current events impacting education and public policy.
Jason Altmire (00:04):
Welcome to another edition of Career Education Report. I'm Jason Altmire. We're going to continue our focus on the workforce shortage. We've mentioned the nationwide workforce shortage across a number of professions. And when you think about the skills gap that exists, often we think about the skilled trades, things such as truck driving, HVAC, auto and aviation technicians, welders, people who are rebuilding America through the infrastructure that's being built across the country.
(00:38):
And we think about issues like nursing and healthcare and teachers, and those are issues where there's also an enormous shortage of workers. But I think what many people do not consider or think about with regard to the skills gap is technology workers. We do hear a lot about the CHIPS Act that was passed and the need to find manufacturing and workers who can build these CHIPS. But the technology sector generally has undergone a huge shortage of workers and there are organizations out there to help solve this problem. And we're just thrilled today to talk about this issue and be joined by Jennifer Carlson. She is the Co-founder and Executive Director of the Washington Technology Industries Association Workforce Institute and a nationwide organization called Apprenti, which is helping to solve the problem. And we're going to talk about that. Jennifer, thank you for being with us.
Jennifer Carlson (01:39):
Thank you for having me.
Jason Altmire (01:40):
I think we can start by talking about that issue of the shortage of tech workers in the country. How are you quantifying what exactly qualifies as a tech worker when you think about that shortage, but maybe even more importantly, what's causing the gap and what's the quantifiable number that exists of workers that we need in the country and what's the shortage look like?
Jennifer Carlson (02:07):
Well, there's a debate about how to quantify the number, but I can give you a range. The challenge or the way we define I should say the technology roles are everything from an entry level technology position, like help desk all the way up through data science, which are typically PhDs and math at the other end of that spectrum or architects for platforms. That range of tech jobs. So we're not including sales and tech support or marketing and customer service. These are pure people with a tech practical skill that they can apply in their role. There are roughly estimated a million of those roles that are unfilled currently in the US and that spectrum changes when you add things like cybersecurity, which has another 300,000 vacancies that aren't filled, and those kind of peripheral roles like tech sales and things where they still require a basic knowledge of technology, but other skill sets unrelated. That could add another couple hundred thousand on top of that.
(03:11):
The limit we have is one, the industry is created for itself by putting a college degree requirement on everything. And the fact that if you aggregate all of the four-year degrees related to this, so your computer science degrees and technology and computer engineers, we only graduate about 85,000 people a year at the four-year level in this country. And we're creating exponentially 300 to 400,000 jobs a year on top of that. So not only do we have this million to a million and a half gap, we also have the creation of another 2 to 400,000 new jobs a year that can't be closed by higher ed.
Jason Altmire (03:51):
And just to clarify, when you're talking about 85,000 graduates a year, you're talking about four-year degrees in the technology fields?
Jennifer Carlson (04:00):
That's right. So that's your computer science and engineering degrees, and it's at the four-year level. So those are baccalaureates, obviously we'll add to that on the graduate school, but it's a much smaller number. We're competing for the same talent. So everybody is looking to grab those people and there's still attrition in that number that we're not taking.
Jason Altmire (04:19):
We're going to talk more about Apprenti and the specific work that you're doing to help solve the problem. But traditionally, before Apprenti came along as this problem was evolving and getting worse over the years, what was the educational background of a tech worker? What was required for someone to be considered qualified to take these type of jobs that you're speaking of?
Jennifer Carlson (04:42):
You're looking usually for engineering titles, so computer science or computer science engineers. Occasionally other kinds of engineering roles that if you look at all engineers we graduate in this country at the four-year level. So mechanical, electrical, civil, and all of those, it's only 250,000 that we graduate and they're going to other industries. And then math is typically one. On occasion, certificates could be put in there with an unrelated college degree, so it might be business degree, but with other certifications that we could take, but that's a pretty limited number of people that we were attracting.
Jason Altmire (05:21):
So then tell me about Apprenti. What does the organization do? What is its mission?
Jennifer Carlson (05:27):
So our mission is really the thesis was that we can train people from non-traditional backgrounds, meaning people without a college degree or an unrelated degree and accelerate that classroom training. If they have basic skills, they're capable of learning, they have good logic and critical thinking and some basic math. You don't have to be able to write an algorithm in your head. If you have good critical thinking skills, we can probably re-skill you or up-skill you into a technology role at a middle skill level, not an entry level. And that not all jobs in our sector are created equal and yet we've created them or treated them equally with a college degree requirement, that really doesn't need to be there. It's an artificial limiter. And so we take the talent that we find in the industry, an average person walking down the street and re-skill them through industry certifications to be able to go work on software development, app development, cloud administration, cyber security, and a wide range of other roles.
Jason Altmire (06:30):
It might seem self-evident, but what would be the skill set that an individual would need to have other than an interest in these subjects. But what just sort of their innate personality and their skill set, what type of person would you think be the most successful to go through this type of retraining?
Jennifer Carlson (06:52):
Somebody with good critical thinking skills. Somebody who likes to solve problems somebody who looks at root fundamentals of any situation in their life and can get to that root issue and try to problem solve their way out of it. Those are the kinds of skills that are in demand for us. And if you look at the average person coming into us, we really focus on eliminating as much of the transferable bias that our industry generally has. We are notorious for stack ranking your prior work experience and which school you went to get your degree. And so part of what we're doing is we're screening people from diverse backgrounds to share with us what skills they bring to the table. And we're looking at people who have maybe hired people, who have done some supply chain management, have done timekeeping exercises. And that can come in any form. That can come from being in the military, that can come from running a restaurant. That can come from even being a truck driver and doing logistics.
(07:56):
We can take those basic skills and repurpose them into our industry. And companies, once you de-identify and take away the stigma or the idea of where they got the skill and what it applied to and we present it more benignly without that industry slant, the companies look at that and go, oh, those are great skills. We like having those skills and we see value in those skills. And then you add in that classroom training that we can do at a really accelerated pace. And those two things immediately can get somebody prepared to take on these jobs. The best part of an apprenticeship, which is the system that we use, is just like the building trades, it gives them a longer on-ramp to get acclimated to doing the work. So they're mentored on the job for a minimum of a year or 2000 hours where a company is paying them what's called a training wage and they're earning and learning on the job, and it's a one-year audition to grow into the role.
Jason Altmire (08:50):
So it sounds like leadership is a big part of this. You're looking for people who've led organizations, but at least have the capability of leadership.
Jennifer Carlson (08:59):
Sure. And that leadership can come in any form. You may have been a leadership position running a daycare. The fact is that you've also worked in a high-stress environment if you were running a daycare and you've got a lot of other logistics trainings that come with that, including the ability to teach, which is already putting you a step ahead. If you're working in an environment where you're learning rapidly, you've probably done that exercise and you've got the skill set to teach it to somebody else.
Jason Altmire (09:27):
So with regard to Apprenti, the name is kind of a giveaway that apprenticeships are a big part of what you do. But maybe talk a little bit more about how you create these pathways and how you use the model of apprenticeship as the basis for solving the problem.
Jennifer Carlson (09:43):
This is a traditional apprenticeship, just like you think of, as you mentioned earlier in the building trades. This is a industry-led program. So when I say industry, part of the reason we have this giant gap in employment is every company is a tech company now. Whether you're food service or you're retail or you're a high-tech. And so we have this large gap because every company is competing for the same talent now. And every company has what we kind of call utility technology roles that those software development, app development, cybersecurity, online transactions. And so the folks that are coming into this are coming into it because they have an interest. And so on the model of apprenticeship, these folks are coming in and learning in a classroom environment because there is a requirement for getting the skill set just like there is in the building trades, but it's accelerated and compressed to the front instead of synchronous on the job skilling the way it works in the building trades. And then they go to a job for a minimum of a year.
(10:49):
So I don't take anybody in that I don't have a job commitment for from an employer. That is an apprenticeship. An apprenticeship is a job. It's a paid earn and learn model. So you get this classroom training paid for and you get this paid environment for a minimum of 2000 hours where you're being mentored into the job. And the company's commitment is that this is a train to retain model where we're getting these people trained to a level that they can be retained in that job and carry on after their apprenticeship when they graduate. 90% of them end up staying with their employer of record and are offered to stay in that role going forward.
Jason Altmire (11:28):
You've mentioned a couple of times the classroom setting. Where are the classrooms? Where would somebody get this in-person instruction?
Jennifer Carlson (11:35):
Pre-COVID it was instruction that was done in-person. Compliments of COVID we've migrated it to an online environment, but it is synchronous. So it is with an instructor and you do still work in teams on projects. So it is not self-taught and self-directed. And the employer tells us what the minimum level of training or the requirements of training are to get somebody prepared for that job within their company. And then we have about 70 different training providers that we work with across the country to get them that classroom training.
(12:08):
And part of the process is we enroll you in the training that's going to get you prepared for that employer's expectations. And that training can take anywhere from 10 to 20 weeks and it's 40 hours a week immersive. So you're in with an instructor, you have lab time that you're working on your projects. In many cases there is a industry recognized certification, so you're objectively taking a test and earning the cert. And in some cases like software development where that doesn't exist, they're also doing capstone projects. So they're leaving with a portfolio and the instructor and the company are seeing what their capabilities are before they leave to go to the job.
Jason Altmire (12:47):
Who are the instructors? Who are the training providers that you referenced? Are they Apprenti employees or are they adjuncts or are they people that you're contracting with? How does that side of it work?
Jennifer Carlson (12:58):
I think adjunct is probably the best way to put it. It's a combination of higher ed in some cases or industry certified boot camps or certified corporate trainers. If you think of it in terms of the timing, the fact that we're compressing it to the front end and we're doing those immersive classroom environments, that's not typically conducive to higher ed, which is why we use the private boot camps or certified corporate trainers. But in the case of higher ed, on occasion we'll use them and it's on the continuing education side of their house as opposed to the academic side. There's an instructor who is coming from industry or has traditional pedagogical understanding of doing this teaching and they're teaching the apprentices.
(13:42):
But we're compressing that classroom time that might've taken a year and a half to two years in a community college environment to get an associate's degree and we're compressing it up front. And then that's getting them prepared to walk into the job. Building trades, they might've started much slower and just been on job sites for many months before actually getting to do the hands-on work. The technology industry has kind of pushed back on that notion and said, we need them to be able to sit down and look at a SQL Server and be able to do queries immediately and understand what those are, not look over somebody's shoulder for some period of time. So they've identified that we still need the same number of classroom hours that the trades do, we're just forcing it to the front end.
Jason Altmire (14:28):
And if somebody wants to get into this career transition, do they find you? How would somebody make themselves available to this type of programming?
Jennifer Carlson (14:39):
I wish I could give one answer for that. It's kind of becoming a stratified platform now. It used to be you would come exclusively to ApprentiCareers.org and apply. And there's an online skills assessment and it's set up so that you can take it in chunks, and it's a logic test and some basic math testing on algebra. There's also some tools out there to help you prepare before you take that assessment. And then if you score better than an 80, you're in my candidate pool. And we will tee you up and you get to pick the areas of the country that you're willing to work in or the cities that are going to be best for you, and we'll try to match you up that way. We also now have employers that are using this process for upskilling people internally and taking them out of non-technical roles and moving them into technical roles.
(15:26):
So it's being used for everything from baggage handlers and people in retail floors to move into cloud operations and software development within a company. Those companies already like those people, hired them once and are giving them an opportunity to grow in their career with the company. Then on occasion, we have some companies that will post apprenticable jobs on their website and you can apply directly through them. And they aggregate the candidate pool and we help with the screening process so that we can get at those skill sets and not make it about stack ranking, there are no resumes. And that helps the client then narrow down the field of people that they're going to consider for those roles. And so it's a hybrid of employer driven plus Apprenti driven.
Jason Altmire (16:12):
And where does Apprenti get its funding? Where does the money come from and what is the cost to a student to go through the program? What's their own personal financial cost?
Jennifer Carlson (16:23):
Well, for the time being, and I'm happy to say hopefully foreseeable future, it's zero cost to the apprentice and the person coming into it. The funding is coming from a combination of sources. The federal government, US Department of Labor, US Department of Commerce helped to underwrite our cost, both from an OPEX perspective as well as the training cost. They're helping to fund that tuition. And what isn't being funded by government is being subsidized by the employer so that that keeps a zero cost on the shoulders of the apprentice coming in.
Jason Altmire (16:55):
Most people when they think of apprentice, they're thinking of unions. Union model of apprenticeship is over time, over the decades has been sort of the premier model when you think of apprenticeships. So how are you different? How do you work with, what is the role of organized labor and unions in this model?
Jennifer Carlson (17:17):
So apprenticeship is its own training model, hard stop. Anybody can use the training model of apprenticeship. And there is a registered apprenticeship model, which is what we participate in much like the building trades and the unions do. And that registration gets you as the apprentice a credential on exit that in time the government's goal is that it becomes background verifiable much like a college degree is so that you can establish, I've completed an apprenticeship in this particular role and I now have this many years of experience. And that becomes the equivalency on your resume as putting what your prior education was. That's the functional direction we're moving. The union aspect of it is simply how a particular industry operates. We are agnostic on that front.
(18:05):
We have some people who are represented that we work with the unions on, and most of the people in tech are not represented, just simply not something that occurs in our industry. That doesn't mean that it won't happen, but it's not a function of us. And again, healthcare is a good example of one that's very split. Some are represented, some are not. And the system of apprenticeship works either way. It doesn't change anything in how it functions.
Jason Altmire (18:31):
And you have placed people in all 50 states right?
Jennifer Carlson (18:34):
We have. So the last date that we placed in was Wyoming last year with a remote employee.
Jason Altmire (18:41):
And then how many employers across the country have signed up to help with this initiative?
Jennifer Carlson (18:47):
So through Apprenti, explicitly about 280 employers that we work with that work with us on the standards that have been drafted that they inform. And then another 18 employers that are operating their own program in-house separate from us but we helped them build that program and get it stood up so that there's continuity and that the job skills look the same so that if you complete an apprenticeship, it's portable. You can work anywhere and know that that job skill looks the same in any industry or in any company. That is just Apprenti but we're not the only purveyors or intermediary for tech apprenticeships. So there are a couple of other programs out there that also do similar work, but just on a different tier of job class.
Jason Altmire (19:31):
And how do employers find Apprenti? I would assume there are probably hundreds more across the country that would like to be involved if they knew about it. How do they find you and how do you make it known that you're out there?
Jennifer Carlson (19:44):
Well, as a nonprofit, we don't have huge pockets to do advertising so we tend to do a lot of conferences and we'll be speaking at SHRM, their national conference for example. And we speak at conferences that are employer based in a number of states or are convened by chambers of commerce. That's typically how we get the word out. But everybody is welcome and we work with them directly if they reach out to us through ApprentiCareers.org, there's an interest page and they can give us their information and we will circle back and get right back to them. We have people across the country and our business development team that will reach right back out and also help them leverage others in their industry sector who have similar needs but maybe don't have enough of their own needs to hire an entire cohort. We can do large numbers and small.
Jason Altmire (20:34):
Well, hopefully this podcast will help a little bit in helping to get the word out. Thank you for the work that you're doing and especially thank you for being with us today. Our guest has been Jennifer Carlson. She's the Co-founder, Executive Director of Washington Technology Industries Association Workforce Institute and what we've been talking about today, her work at Apprenti. Jennifer, thank you for being with us.
Jennifer Carlson (21:00):
Thank you so much for having me.
Jason Altmire (21:06):
Thanks for joining me for this episode of the Career Education Report. Subscribe and rate us on Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts. For more information, visit our website at career.org and follow us on Twitter @cecued. That's @C-E-C-U-E-D. Thank you for listening.