Georgia Embraces Germany’s Apprenticeship Model
Date Posted: January 30, 2018
Posted In: Ideas, News, Workforce,
From Marketplace: Factory workers are aging and manufacturers are worried there won’t be enough young people with the technical skills to do their jobs. So 10 states have embraced Germany’s apprenticeship model to help fill these manufacturing positions.
In Georgia, high school students are training for factory jobs in a German-style apprenticeship program. Seventeen-year-old Northgate High School student, Cole McKeehan, has a busy schedule but still manages to wake up at 3 a.m. on Fridays so he can get to his job at E.G.O. North America.
“I love coming to work. This is something you know, unique, it’s something I’ve never seen before,” McKeehan said. “My parents love it. They wish they had something like this they could have done.” When he arrives at work, he clocks in, heads to his toolbox at his work station and gets hands-on training from an older employee who serves as his mentor.
E.G.O. is a radiant heating elements and electronics factory, which mostly makes the parts inside electric stoves, in Newnan, about an hour’s drive south of Atlanta.
The state of Georgia wants more teens like McKeehan to get exposure to manufacturing while they’re in high school by expanding the Georgia Consortium for Advanced Technical Training (CATT). Students start the three-year program when they’re 15 and are matched with a nearby technical college and a factory where they learn technical skills firsthand.
McKeehan splits his time between his studies at his high school, classes at the technical college and work experience shaping metal at E.G.O., where he makes $10 an hour. He said he still hangs out with his high school friends, but has an awareness of real-world responsibilities.
“I’ve been raised to know that I will one day have to work to live and I’m going to have to grow up quicker,” he said. “I see it as two steps early and getting out there, getting it done.”
This year, he expects to graduate with a high school diploma, an associate’s degree in precision manufacturing and a full-time job offer. McKeehan is currently one of 27 students in the apprenticeship program. It began with just 10 students in the fall of 2016 in Coweta County, Georgia.
“This is a great win-win for not only the student but obviously for industry,” said Georgia Lt. Gov. Casey Cagle. The state launched the program in 2016 after a German company, Grenzebach, which makes manufacturing equipment for other factories, had trouble finding workers, Cagle said.