White House Green-lights Tech Apprenticeship Program

theodp writes: The Washington Technology Industry Association (WTIA) says a $3.5 million U.S. Dept. of Labor grant will help it create a registered apprenticeship program that aims to train 600 people over the next five years. Participants would pay tuition for 3-4 months of pre-apprenticeship training and then be placed with an employer such as Microsoft, Accenture, F5 Networks, or Impinj for a paid apprenticeship lasting 12-18 month, which organizers hope will lead to a permanent position. Candidates will begin with a series of assessments to gauge their potential to learn computer science fundamentals. For those who pass the WTIA's tech skills assessment, next is a pre-apprenticeship training, which is estimated to cost between $5,000 and $10,000 per person. The training will follow existing certificate programs, such as those developed by Microsoft for military veterans transitioning to new careers in tech. The Get in I.T. Apprenticeship program, the White House explains, "will target recruiting women, people of color, and transitioning military members."

Comments

Unintended consequences

[DoofusOfDeath]

Participants would pay tuition for 3-4 months of pre-apprenticeship training and then be placed with an employer such as Microsoft

People demanded that we stop letting prisons put people into solitary for months at a time, and now they use this as a replacement. Think things through, sheeple!!!

MSSA Schedule at Central TX College

[theodp]

Microsoft Software & Systems Academy: Certificate Cost: $3040.00

We'll this sucks

[rsilvergun]

Tuition? Back in my day we called that training and the company paid you.

Re:We'll this sucks

[Nrrqshrr]

I dream of a day when companies will look at their employees like members of a family, and not a set of expandable parts.

Re:So, no seats in the program for me

[AmiMoJo]

If you read the fine print it's open to everyone, including white males. They are just making a specific effort to attract people from the groups mentioned, probably because experience tells them that most applicants will be white and male and they want more representative levels of diversity.

Clueless

[tomhath]

WTIA leaders believe an apprenticeship program can contribute quickly, providing a non-traditional route into the technology industry, specifically to the high-paying jobs at its heart: software development engineers and technical project managers.

(WTIA CEO Michael Schutzler says) ...“When you graduate from college—even if you graduate from UW or MIT or Stanford—basically what you know is some mechanics about coding,”

Really? Someone with a degree from MIT or Stanford is no more qualified for a software development engineer or technical project manager role than an apprentice who just finished a 16 month internship? He really thinks that?

Re:Target audience

[hambone142]

120 people per year for five years.

Hardly worth mentioning.

Sure, but not for just this reason

[s.petry]

The program puts out roughly 60,000 per person, for 600 people to be 'apprenticed'. I'm not sure how much the precursors are, or if it will weed anything out (does not sound like it). Start writing those Congress Critters though, because this is pure shit.

Why this sucks should be painfully obvious. This is Public funding to pay for Private company workers. I guess that the H1-B free-for-all they have not been able to get means that they won't pay for people in a slightly different way. Federal Tax dollars will be used to put employees into Microsoft, and a couple other much smaller companies. Meaning Microsoft will be reaping the benefit of free employees on the tax payer dime.

Here is the thing that I repeatedly see that pisses me off.

The state’s booming tech industry needs an estimated 3,500 new employees each year with a computer science degree, but Washington’s higher education system turns out only about 500.

Good grief, if you want graduates in a field you PAY THEM A GOOD WAGE! We have ass loads of Business degrees because the only way to have a reasonable chance of hitting the business lottery is in either the financial services or executive fields. If you want more welders, pay people to learn the trade. This is such a basic solution to the problem I get infuriated every time I see complaints like above.

How many people heading to college want to spend 4+ years in school (probably a good pile of debt) to make low middle class income with a STEM degree? NONE! Because on average after 20 years experience you have a chance for medium to higher middle class income, but you are not going higher than this without moving into management.