On July 14, Secretary of Labor Marty Walsh testified before the Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education Subcommittee of the Senate Appropriations Committee to discuss President Biden’s Fiscal Year 2022 budget request for the Department of Labor.
During the hearing, Secretary Walsh and several senators on the committee highlighted the importance of apprenticeships, as well as the need to improve access to them. Sen. Patty Murray (D-WA), Chairwoman of the Subcommittee, noted that apprenticeships lead to good-paying, high demand jobs, and emphasized that providing more funding for them will help improve access to apprenticeships for women and workers of color who are historically underrepresented in these programs – and subsequently, in the careers that they lead to.
Sen. Tammy Baldwin (D-WI) announced plans to soon reintroduce her apprenticeships legislation, the PARTNERS Act, that would focus on collaboration between smaller workplaces, technical colleges and workforce boards to help create apprenticeship programs.
Ranking Member Roy Blunt (R-MO) commended Missouri for its second-place rank nationally in active apprenticeships, and added that the state has a goal of having 20,000 active apprenticeships by 2025. Sen. Blunt asked how apprenticeships could be developed in industries like health care, cybersecurity or finance; Secretary Walsh responded that working with businesses to develop industry partnerships and create career pathways is just one way to accomplish that goal, but a great advantage of apprenticeships is that students are paid for their work while learning on the job.
Secretary Walsh concluded that retraining and reskilling workers must be a coordinated, bipartisan effort.
You can watch the full hearing on the Senate Appropriations Committee’s website.
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