Labor Department Provides $50.5 Million in Grants for Apprenticeships

Deadline: September 7, 2016
Grant Website

The United States Department of Labor recently announced the availability of the ApprenticeshipUSA State Expansion Grants, which provides $50.5 million worth of funding to help states expand and diversify apprenticeship opportunities.

Apprenticeships provide pathways for a wide range of workers to acquire experience needed for career advancement in jobs in a diverse set of fields, including information technology, healthcare, advanced manufacturing, building trades, cybersecurity and business services.

Thirty-three grants will be awarded, and they will range from $700,000 to $3.2 million. The grants aim to help integrate apprenticeship into education and workforce systems as well as to provide support to expand opportunities for groups typically under-represented in registered apprenticeships, such as at-risk youth, women, people of color, Native Americans and individuals with disabilities.

“The Obama Administration is ‘all in’ on apprenticeship for a simple reason: it works,” said U.S. Secretary of Labor, Thomas E. Perez. “Apprenticeships are a time-tested, earn-while-you-learn model that helps create opportunities for American workers to succeed while providing employers with the reliable pipeline of skilled talent they need to thrive in today’s global economy.”

This grant competition is the second phase of the department’s $90 million funding, which was announced in April. Both of these phases build on last year’s unprecedented $175 investment that was announced by the Obama administration last September.