Building apprenticeships that deliver for low-income youth—and employers

Nearly 70% of U.S. employers are struggling to recruit skilled workers, according to ManpowerGroup USA. At the same time, over 4.3 million 16-24-year-olds are not working or enrolled in school, per Measure of America’s 2024 report on youth disconnection.

Registered Apprenticeship Programs (RAPs) can help bridge the gap between these groups. By pairing structured, employer-driven training with a paycheck, RAPs offer a genuine path to economic mobility for people who can’t afford to wait for a credential before they start earning.

Yet RAPs remain underused. Too often, agencies and employers view apprenticeships as limited vocational pathways rather than scalable workforce strategies that can address evolving talent needs. And, for all their fanfare, apprenticeship programs have high attrition rates; in 2021, less than 35% of apprentices completed their programs, according to an American Institutes for Research analysis of U.S. Department of Labor Data.

RAPs that deliver sustainable benefits to employers, apprentices, and communities have strong leaders who view these programs as more than just pipeline fillers. These leaders think critically about who they partner with, who they serve, how they should serve them, and for how long.

Build a strong coalition

It takes many organizations to deliver high-quality RAPs. Yet these groups—human services agencies, workforce boards, education systems, community-based organizations, and employers—often struggle with collaboration. Each organization holds a different piece of the puzzle (e.g., labor market intelligence, funding authority, relationships with youth, credentialing infrastructure), and their expertise tends to be siloed.

When these cross-sector organizations come together to support a RAP, there can easily be confusion over who’s responsible for what. Leaders must clearly define their organization’s role and avoid replicating what other partners already do well.

Ian McMahon, director of the Colorado Division of Economic and Workforce Support, shared his office’s approach. Rather than building a parallel apprenticeship infrastructure, the state’s Department of Human Services established an interagency agreement with the Colorado Department of Labor and Employment. This partnership leveraged the labor agency’s expertise in market information and sector strategy while the human services agency contributed knowledge of the target populations and socioeconomic barriers they face. Each agency leverages its strengths rather than attempting to cover every aspect of the work on its own.

Know who you’re designing for

For young people living in poverty, the pressure to earn income now is a defining reality. Workforce training programs that front-load requirements or delay wages will continue to see high attrition rates because they don’t reflect that urgency.

RAPs that successfully serve low-income youth center their voices as design inputs. Effective RAPs ask prospective apprentices what stabilization means in their context, what has failed them before, and what would attract them to a RAP opportunity. Embedding these insights at every level positions participants for success during and after the apprenticeship.

Foster an inclusive workplace culture

Inclusion at the point of entry isn’t the same as belonging once you’re inside. Before offering apprenticeships, employers need to ensure they have a culture that will receive and nurture youth who come from underrepresented or marginalized communities. Whether positive or negative, the environment in which an apprentice works shapes their experience and sense of their long-term opportunities and advancement.

This kind of cultural introspection can pay dividends. When an employer brings in a young person at age 17 or 18 and makes a genuine investment in their development, they’re opening the door to a long-term relationship with that employee over time. Young workers from a range of backgrounds bring perspective, loyalty, and insight into emerging markets that may be less represented in more established workforces. Capturing this value requires leaders to be accountable for the culture their apprentices encounter, not just the credentials they earn.

Stay in it for the long haul

Organizations that operate RAPs must treat the holistic stabilization of participants as a strategic priority. In Colorado, McMahon’s team has reoriented its case managers to focus on wraparound services like housing and transportation support, as well as ensuring apprentices have the tools and equipment they need to participate fully.

To truly secure economic mobility for RAP participants, McMahon says, holistic services can’t end when the apprenticeship does. Pulling supports before a young person has achieved financial and situational security risks reversing the progress they’ve made through the program.

Sustaining those commitments requires structural changes to these RAPs. Statements of work must allow for the responsive, individualized support that low-income youth often need. Funding models need flexibility to support participants for longer timelines. Success metrics must move away from short-term completion rates and to longer-term indicators of economic stability. If RAPs are measured solely by how many apprentices complete the program, the organizations backing the RAP will continue to underserve their target population.

Leadership decisions should make a difference

We know that apprenticeships are a powerful lever that can lift young people out of poverty. Apprentices see a 77% wage increase upon completion of a program, and 91% of RAP graduates stay employed after finishing their programs, according to Department of Labor data. Outcomes like these are transformative for apprentices, as well as their families and communities. And they’re good for employers, too: Increasing the number of people who successfully complete RAPs is an efficient way to close skills gaps.

But this potential cannot materialize on its own. RAPs can deliver the most benefit when the leaders involved are willing to make intentional choices about coalition, culture, and long-term commitment instead of credential-counting. Getting these decisions right is how apprenticeships become what they’re meant to be: A pathway out of poverty for young people who need it most.