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America has more than 6 million vacant jobs, yet the country is "facing a serious skills gap," Labor Secretary R. Alexander Acosta recently said. And last week his boss, President Donald Trump, said he wants to close this gap by directing $100 million of federal money into apprenticeship programs. Apprenticeships in the U.S. are generally known for training workers for blue collar jobs like plumbers or electricians, but with a little tweak, they could be the path to lucrative, white collar tech jobs across the country. Not just in coastal cities, but also in the Midwest, South, and across the Great Plains.
But to get there we need to erase the notion that highly paid jobs require a college degree. It's not always true. LinkedIn CEO Jeff Weiner, among others, has called for a shift in focus: "skills, not degrees. It's not skills at the exclusion of degrees. It's just expanding our perspective to go beyond degrees."
An academic degree signals to employers that a person has successfully completed a course of study, but it does not provide a clear assessment of someone's skills. Companies, especially in the science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) industries, are shifting their recruiting process from "where did you study?" to "what can you do?".
Germans have long cited their apprenticeship system as a factor in their economic success. Would it help America and elsewhere, too?
(Score: 1) by arcz on Thursday June 29 2017, @07:50PM (3 children)
I can tell the university system is not quite adequate to prepare people for real world work. Glad to see this change.
(Score: 2) by bzipitidoo on Thursday June 29 2017, @10:43PM (1 child)
Is job training "for real world work" the only value you see in university education?
(Score: 2, Insightful) by khallow on Friday June 30 2017, @04:10AM
Is asking loaded questions the only way you can argue? One can believe, for example, that there's value in using money to buy orange juice without believing that is the only use for money. Similarly, one can believe that preparing for the working world is a valuable application (perhaps even the most value application) of a university education without believing that is the only value to a university education.
But what of it if they do believe such? How much in error is such a viewpoint?
(Score: 1) by Ethanol-fueled on Friday June 30 2017, @12:19AM
That's because it's not supposed to be. An internship or first job is. The problem is that everybody in America offers only either unpaid part-time internships or they demand a non-negotiable 3 years of experience for even entry-level jobs.
This is why networking and having a social-media presence are so heavily pushed now - they're basically admitting that your only job prospects out of college will be the result of nepotism rather than skill.