Description

The transit sector has begun to embrace apprenticeships as a worthwhile training model. Apprenticeships may also address young people’s interest in career advancement opportunities, an additional benefit to the transit sector as it replaces an aging workforce and resolves other recruitment challenges. Apprenticeships that emphasize both technical and soft skills invest in career advancement by offering employees the chance to develop “cross-cutting competencies.” A highly developed model of this approach is found in the Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority Joint Workforce Initiative (JWI), which formally recognizes skills acquisition with accredited certificates. Further development of this model would find support in initiatives to restructure postsecondary education in ways that better integrate non-degree and degree programs. Those efforts are gaining strength in response to persistent non-completion rates and declining college wealth premiums. This study contextualizes the JWI’s strengths within the revival of non-degree credentials fueled by efforts like the California Guided Pathways Program. It identifies the JWI as a good candidate for pathways that lead to a degree. Drawing on guidelines for connecting job training with degree programs, the study details the importance of affordability, portability, and articulation and outlines how these features could be further developed in the JWI.

Publication Date

12-2024

Publication Type

Report

Topic

Transit and Passenger Rail, Planning and Policy, Workforce and Labor

Digital Object Identifier

10.31979/mti.2024.2364

MTI Project

2364

Keywords

Curricula, Transit operators, Universities and colleges, Recruiting, Personnel development

Disciplines

Transportation | Vocational Education

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