Workforce

Groups that focus on helping college students and working adults build networks are expanding their models amid growing interest, including from colleges and employers.

Staffing shortages in healthcare could make stackable credentials real.

Bitwise Industries, in Fresno, has prepared more than 10K students for tech jobs with accelerated training and paid apprenticeships. It’s expanding to nine more cities.

The hot labor market drove a 41% increase last year in registered apprenticeship programs in tech fields.

Healthcare companies are getting more creative about recruiting and retaining workers without bachelor’s degrees — including by covering costs for degrees, certificates, and certifications to offer upward mobility for employees who want to advance in their careers.

Community colleges are at the center of a campaign to get more students interested in optics manufacturing.

For short-term credentials to have the best chance of paying off for students, an emerging view holds that they need to be heavily subsidized—with funding from employers or foundations if government support isn’t there—while offering connections to actual living-wage jobs.

Americans view college as expensive and time-consuming and believe the economy is fundamentally unfair, new research found.