News

N. Idaho School-to-Registered Apprenticeship Program (STRAP) helps student apprentices

A pilot program in northern Idaho that employs high school student apprentices could help the region meet a need for more skilled workers while serving as a model for the rest of the state.

"I kind of was leaning toward going to college," said Chris Hanley, a student at Coeur d’Alene’s Lake City High School. "When I found out I could learn wire feed welding and get paid, I jumped on it."

Hanley works in the machine shop at Bay Shore Systems, a Rathdrum manufacturing company.

The program is the School-to-Registered Apprenticeship Program, or STRAP. It was developed by the U.S. Department of Labor and offers high school students the opportunity to receive long-term career and occupational training both in the classroom and at an approved job site.

Full Story: http://www.magicvalley.com/articles/2008/03/20/ap-state-id/d8vgo3ng0.txt

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The Fundamentals of Implementing a School-to-Registered Apprenticeship Program http://www.openop.com/ci/fundamentals/all.html

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Strap it on, apprentices

Slowly but surely, piece by piece, a master plan for a burgeoning segment of the employment sector is coming together.

You sampled a slice of it Wednesday when you read the front-page story about the School-to-Registered-Apprentice Program. STRAP, as it’s called, was developed by the U.S. Department of Labor. Its implementation in Kootenai County as a pilot program suggests it will become a model for the rest of the state.

The program works with high school students in teaching them, through apprenticeships, skills that are and will be in high demand. By the time the student graduates, she or he can anticipate a good-paying job with benefits, as well as a promising career ladder. Many of these students will quickly be earning more than their friends who graduate from college, and with every bit as much earning potential further down the employment road.

We applaud the people who are making this program work because we firmly believe that a good life starts with a good job. We also believe that with a little bit of encouragement and the elimination of an irrational stigma, we may soon be matching more bright, industrious young people with good jobs as they pursue the good life.

The stigma is that society frowns upon those who pursue vocational careers. It’s been all too common for several generations to insist that only the best and brightest go on to college. Know what? Three out of every four high school graduates in our region will never finish college, so the stigma is not just groundless, it’s destructive.

Unfulfilled students drop out of college, feeling like failures and facing at least an immediate future of no job prospects and potentially high debt from school loans. Employers desperate for skilled workers underachieve, holding back business and stalling the creation of more good jobs.

STRAP is an exciting new step in the right direction, and there are more in the works which you will be reading about soon. But in the meantime, let’s examine our attitudes and the ways we communicate about technical and vocational careers. Some of our most capable citizens work in vocational fields not because they have to, but because they choose to. And these days, they’re laughing all the way to the bank.

http://www.cdapress.com/articles/2008/03/22/editorials/edit01.txt

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