washingtonmonthly--2020-08-31--Why Apprenticeships Should Go Soft

Why Apprenticeships Should Go Soft

For more than a decade , economists , business leaders , and progressive writers and thinkers have waged a wonky war over the so-called skills gap—specifically , whether such a gap exists at all .
Employers , for their part , argue that the skills gap is real , and complain that it makes it tough to find qualified workers .
Many progressives , however , say these gaps are a myth , the product of businesses ’ own failings .
They charge employers with inflating the credentials required of applicants and skimping on worker training .
Research shows that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ companies are indeed guilty of “ degree inflation , ” demanding college degrees for jobs that don ’ t need them .
Companies have also reduced investment in worker training over the past 20 years , forcing employees to seek more training themselves at community and for-profit colleges , often going into debt to pay for it .
According to a recent report from the Aspen Institute , less than one-fifth of workers have access to employer-sponsored or on-the-job training , and they tend to be the highest paid and already the best @ @ @ @ @ @ @ too .
Many entry-level workers today are missing a crucial set of skills that most high schools and colleges don ’ t teach : the so-called soft skills that are increasingly important for success in the modern workplace .
These include basic workplace-survival behaviors like showing up every day and on time , and knowing how to talk to your boss and colleagues .
They also include higher-order skills like critical thinking , problem solving , and collaboration .
While more K–12 schools have begun teaching critical thinking and analytical skills under the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ it ’ s hardly part of the standard curriculum , nor is the pedagogy established about how to teach it well .
As a consequence , most students don ’ t learn in their classrooms what life is like on the job—and it shows .
Employers , says a U.S. Chamber of Commerce Foundation report , are “ coping with new hires who are unsure of how to write a professional email , struggle to organize and prioritize tasks , or have a difficult time collaborating with coworkers.
” A survey of more @ @ @ @ @ @ @ for Human Resource Management yielded a similar finding : About one-third cited a lack of soft skills among candidates as the reason they had trouble filling positions .
One promising program has the potential to end the deadlock over the skills gap , satisfying employers while addressing the skeptics ’ critique that companies skimp on training .
Developed by the Federation for Advanced Manufacturing Education ( FAME ) , this small-but-growing two-year apprenticeship-style program trains students to maintain and repair the machinery that now does most of the rote work of manufacturing .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ As much as two-thirds of students ’ time is spent on soft-skills development , while just one-third is devoted to technical training .
The result is that graduates have excellent professional and collaborative skills , fulfilling employers ’ needs .
But it ’ s also successful enough to draw the kind of financial investment from companies that workers deserve .
First launched at a single Toyota factory in 2010 , it has already grown to involve more than 350 manufacturers in 13 states , from large refrigerator makers to smaller plastics plants .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ graduated so far , 85 percent have been hired by their sponsoring employers with starting salaries at $ 50,000 or more .
And because the students don ’ t pay for their training , they can graduate debt free .
While few issues these days draw bipartisan consensus , politicians as diverse as Joe Biden , Bernie Sanders , and even Donald Trump agree on the need for more high-quality career and technical education opportunities in general , and apprenticeships in particular .
FAME could be the kind of program to drive that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of both employers and workers .
Dennis Dio Parker , the founder of FAME , has grappled for decades with skills shortages , ever since his employer , Toyota , launched a factory in Georgetown , Kentucky , in 1987 .
Now employing 10,000 workers , it ’ s the largest Toyota plant in the world , but when it first opened , the factory had trouble finding enough qualified workers .
“ We needed workers qualified in skilled maintenance—maintaining the conveyor lines , the power to the buildings , the robots , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , whose job was to develop in-house training programs for Toyota .
These workers also needed the problem-solving skills to figure out why a machine might be broken and how to fix it .
In addition , they needed to be able to communicate and work closely with the engineering department and with each other .
Unfortunately , Parker said , “ not many people were passing the assessment tests.
” As Parker tinkered with new training curricula over the years , he interviewed dozens of supervisors about the skills their exceptional workers @ @ @ @ @ @ @ “ Technically , they ’ re highly competent , but they ’ re also great attenders , ” Parker said .
“ We never worry about them missing .
They have great initiative.
” These workers also had great communications and people skills .
Parker set out to train workers to perform like those exceptional employees .
The program he ultimately developed was effective enough to draw the interest of other companies , whom he organized into a collaborative to disseminate the model .
That collaborative became the Federation for Advanced Manufacturing Education @ @ @ @ @ @ @ signature program for technicians has since come to be known as FAME .
From week one , FAME makes clear that it ’ s not a traditional college program where students can get away with playing hooky or sit slouched in the back of class .
At orientation , students receive a collared uniform shirt , which they ’ re expected to wear to class every day .
This insistence on a uniform is actually part of the program ’ s soft-skills curriculum .
“ If you look professional , you ’ ll @ @ @ @ @ @ @ said .
Students also learn the program ’ s expectations about attendance—which is not to be on time , but to be early .
Outside each classroom are attendance sheets with students ’ names and a daily log of arrival times .
Students are marked in green if they are 20 to 30 minutes early to class , while on-time arrivals are marked in yellow and tardies of even one minute past the start time are in pink or red .
A single red mark is enough to warrant a warning ; three @ @ @ @ @ @ @ The emphasis on attendance underscores how the world of work contrasts with that of school , Parker said .
“ Colleges do a terrible job of preparing their students for the rigor and discipline of being a good attender at work .
You can have a student with a 4.0 [ GPA ] who misses classes from time to time , and from the college ’ s perspective , their attendance is perfect .
But they ’ re still going to get fired in a heartbeat on the job.
” At the start @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to the FAME ’ s signature pedagogical prop : laminated “ pocket cards , ” sized to fit in the pocket of a work shirt , that serve as crib sheets for core concepts .
The first week of class , students receive two cards focused on “ safety culture ” and three cards on “ professional behaviors.
” As the program continues , they accumulate more cards , on communication skills , problem solving , “ visual workplace organization , ” and other skills specific to their future jobs as advanced manufacturing @ @ @ @ @ @ @ re expected to memorize and be able to recite each card on command , and , ultimately , to apply the content in a real-life situation .
Each card includes a checklist of required behaviors or core concepts , in simple , direct language .
The “ AMT professional greeting ” card , for example , lays out seven steps for how students are expected to greet each other .
Step 1 is the “ professional posture ” ( described on a separate card ) , followed by Step 2 : “ Greet @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
Look in the eye.
” The sequence ends with Step 7 : “ Tell them you are pleased to meet them and/or offer to help.
” While these instructions might seem basic , they are often eye-openers for the 18- to 20-year-olds who make up the target demographic of the program , Parker said .
“ They have no context or life experience , ” he told me .
The program also drills students in public speaking .
In FAME instructor Chris Lagemann ’ s classroom , for instance , at the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ class begins with a student delivering a presentation on shop floor safety , which the class critiques based on the checklists of do ’ s and don ’ ts spelled out on the pocket cards that define expectations for presentations .
“ They get evaluated on their posture and appearance , ” Lagemann said .
“ Did they stand up straight , and were their hands in front ?
Were they fidgeting or standing still ?
Did they introduce themselves ?
” Lagemann keeps track of how many “ um ” s , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ “ like ” s the presenter uses .
Students run through this exercise twice a day , every day .
“ It ’ s a lot of repetition , ” Lagemann said , but its purpose is to inculcate the skills laid out on the cards to a point of automaticity .
Unlike many other training programs , where students spend several weeks or even months in the classroom before an internship , FAME students spend three days each week on the shop floor immediately applying what they learned .
Lagemann says he @ @ @ @ @ @ @ sponsoring his students alerting them to that week ’ s lessons .
“ If there ’ s something in the plant that coincides or matches that discussion , they ’ ll try to have a job or assignment to practice those skills , ” he said .
“ Likewise , if there ’ s something going on at the plant—if there ’ s a new installation or a shutdown of a particular piece of equipment—the manufacturers let us know that so we can cover that topic or have a 20-minute discussion of what @ @ @ @ @ @ @ partnership between employers and FAME is a big reason why the program ’ s placement rates are so high .
The sponsoring employers “ match ” with students at the start of the program and pay them a minimum of $ 14 an hour—enough to pay for tuition and living expenses .
Instructors like Lagemann do their best to tailor the curriculum to employers ’ specific needs , while a liaison at the company often serves as the student ’ s mentor , assigning work and communicating with instructors .
“ They ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ responsibility from an employer standpoint , ” Lagemann said .
“ They ’ ve agreed to pay this kid 14-plus dollars an hour for two years ; they ’ re going to train them , keep an eye on them , and assess them and hold them to the standards we expect.
” But , he continued , employers “ do get a two-year look to decide whether to give them a full-time job.
” So far , the employers partnering with the program have decided that this level of investment is worth @ @ @ @ @ @ @ FAME , Glenn Dodge had attended one semester of college , with the goal of getting a bachelor ’ s degree in electrical engineering .
“ I learned very quickly that it wasn ’ t the right fit , ” he said .
“ I overburdened myself.
” At age 19 , he dropped out , bringing home thousands of dollars in school debt—but not the degree he ’ d been after .
His stepmother , a guidance counselor at a local high school , pointed him toward FAME .
In 2017 , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Missouri chapter .
Among other things , Dodge credits the program with transforming him from a “ slightly shy ” person into a confident public speaker serious about his work .
“ I stuttered a lot , ” said Dodge , now 21 .
“ I would throw in ‘ uh ’ s and ‘ um ’ s .
I wouldn ’ t give a professional greeting .
I would just start talking.
” The program drastically improved his public speaking .
“ I learned to make eye contact rather than just read @ @ @ @ @ @ @ people could hear me , ” he said .
Dodge ’ s sponsoring employer was a plastics manufacturer , where he had a mentor named Jason Cartwright .
“ He would bring me up into his office every now and then and just draw with Expo marker on his window to explain something , ” Dodge said .
“ He made sure I understood what I was learning and could apply it.
” By the end of the program , Dodge was an excellent prospect for employers .
After graduating in May 2019 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ one week , two of which turned into offers on the spot .
He accepted a job working the third shift as a maintenance technician at Toyota Bodine , where his starting salary was $ 50,000 a year .
He says he ’ ll have the loans from his aborted college career paid off in under five years .
“ I don ’ t understand why people still believe that they need a four-year degree to be a success , ” he said .
“ AMT and the manufacturing field is where the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to FAME ’ s success is its ability to propel the careers of workers who , in other circumstances , might have far more trouble climbing the ranks .
Camryn Vrbka , who enrolled in Missouri FAME ’ s inaugural cohort in 2015 , is the rare woman in a relatively male-dominated field .
“ I liked engineering , and I liked solving problems , but I also found out I don ’ t do calculus for fun , ” she said , by way of explaining why she didn ’ t enroll @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the FAME program with not only opening the door to a well-paid career but also boosting her up the ladder more quickly than she otherwise could have gone .
She , like Dodge , has a job at Toyota Bodine , where she maintains and repairs machines that inject thousands of pounds of molten aluminum at high pressures into molds for engine parts .
These machines , Vrbka said , are about two stories high and take about nine months to master .
Yet Vrbka has already been promoted twice and , at @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the position of group leader , a job that typically requires 10 years of experience .
“ The next-youngest person at my level is at least five years older than me , ” she says .
Vrbka is also getting that four-year degree after all .
She ’ s building on the associate ’ s degree she earned through FAME to get a bachelor ’ s in business administration , with tuition assistance from Toyota and FAME , in a recently added perk to the program .
“ She can go as far @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , Toyota Bodine ’ s hiring manager and the advisory chair of Missouri FAME , told me .
While FAME ’ s target demographic is recent high school graduates , it has shown that it also can benefit older workers who want to “ upskill ” or “ reskill ” from different careers , such as ShuJuanna Johnson , a FAME trainee in Arkansas .
Johnson , now 45 , dropped out of high school when she became pregnant with her daughter .
Although she eventually earned her GED , she found herself @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 15 years at a cleaning company pressing and folding shirts .
“ My primary job was to make sure the shirts were starched , make sure there were no spots or wrinkles , ” she said .
“ It wasn ’ t taking me to the place in life where I wanted to be .
It wasn ’ t a career .
It was just a job , and I didn ’ t want to be living paycheck to paycheck.
” Johnson heard about FAME from counselors at a local community college , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
“ I never had any experience with professional behaviors .
I never even really thought about it , ” she said .
She credits the program with preparing her for a new work environment , as well as improving her time management and communication skills .
Today , she is apprenticing at a Georgia-Pacific facility in Crossett , Arkansas , where she is learning to maintain and repair the machinery that manufactures tissues , paper towels , and other products .
“ It has really inspired me to do things that I @ @ @ @ @ @ @ she said .
So if FAME ’ s approach is so effective , why aren ’ t there already many more programs just like it ?
One reason is that demand for soft skills from employers is relatively new .
Another is that , although more schools are beginning to realize the importance of non-cognitive skills , teaching them isn ’ t yet a core part of most students ’ formal education .
K–12 and higher education still focus on academic achievement and technical knowledge , to the particular disadvantage of workers without @ @ @ @ @ @ @ But even as more educators recognize the importance of soft skills , there ’ s still a final problem : how to define it and teach it .
Definitional and pedagogical challenges abound .
What exactly , for instance , is “ leadership , ” and how is it measured , let alone taught ?
While teaching and testing technical skills is relatively straightforward—a welding student , for example , either performs a sound weld or doesn ’ t—judging that same welder ’ s work habits and ability to get along with colleagues @ @ @ @ @ @ @ subjective .
What FAME has managed to do is transform the squishy concept of soft skills into clear , practicable expectations for behavior and offer students plenty of opportunities for practice , assessment , and feedback .
While there has not yet been a formal evaluation of FAME , one indicator of its potential is the eagerness of employers to invest in the program .
In the spring of 2020 , more than 350 manufacturers were sponsoring trainees across a variety of sectors .
In Missouri , the home of Glenn Dodge and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in addition to Toyota Bodine , the leading commercial refrigerator maker True Manufacturing ( “ If you ’ ve ever gone to Walmart and gotten a soda out of the coolers , that ’ s a True refrigerator , ” Lagemann , the FAME instructor , said ) ; plastic-bottle manufacturer Alpha Packaging ; and local concerns such as Component Bar Products , which creates custom machined parts for automotive and other industries ; and C.A.P.S .
Inc. , a company that specializes in making plastic bottle caps for mustard and ketchup bottles @ @ @ @ @ @ @ coronavirus pandemic has caused delays in some states for the 2020–21 FAME cohort , founder Dennis Dio Parker said employer interest has remained surprisingly stable , even despite the recession , and the program is working to adapt its format for the new realities of the post-pandemic world .
If anything , Parker said , the pandemic could potentially prompt a renaissance of manufacturing in the United States as a result of supply-chain disruptions around the world .
Such “ in-shoring , ” he said , could even prompt more interest from employers @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
Programs like FAME hold important lessons for the future of workforce training .
First , training programs need to make the teaching of soft skills a priority , and FAME shows one way that can be done .
Second , the success of the program ’ s apprenticeship-style format also reinforces the value of work-based learning , which deserves far greater attention and investment .
Research has found that the career-focused programs producing the best results ( as measured by higher wages , for example , and more consistent employment ) are @ @ @ @ @ @ @ FAME is a potentially powerful addition to that repertoire of programs , particularly for its ability to draw investment from employers and for its formalized soft-skills training .
Its model is replicable in sectors beyond manufacturing , too .
In fact , the Manufacturing Institute , which now runs the program , is already looking for other high-demand fields where a FAME-like program can be developed and launched .
As the demand for soft skills continues to grow , innovative efforts like FAME will be increasingly important for ensuring that American industries and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in a global economy .

For more than a decade, economists, business leaders, and progressive writers and thinkers have waged a wonky war over the so-called skills gap—specifically, whether such a gap exists at all.
Check out the complete 2020 Washington Monthly rankings here.
Employers, for their part, argue that the skills gap is real, and complain that it makes it tough to find qualified workers. Many progressives, however, say these gaps are a myth, the product of businesses’ own failings. They charge employers with inflating the credentials required of applicants and skimping on worker training.
Research shows that the progressives have a point: Many companies are indeed guilty of “degree inflation,” demanding college degrees for jobs that don’t need them. Companies have also reduced investment in worker training over the past 20 years, forcing employees to seek more training themselves at community and for-profit colleges, often going into debt to pay for it. According to a recent report from the Aspen Institute, less than one-fifth of workers have access to employer-sponsored or on-the-job training, and they tend to be the highest paid and already the best educated.
But employers are right, too. Many entry-level workers today are missing a crucial set of skills that most high schools and colleges don’t teach: the so-called soft skills that are increasingly important for success in the modern workplace. These include basic workplace-survival behaviors like showing up every day and on time, and knowing how to talk to your boss and colleagues. They also include higher-order skills like critical thinking, problem solving, and collaboration. While more K–12 schools have begun teaching critical thinking and analytical skills under the rubric of “social-emotional learning,” it’s hardly part of the standard curriculum, nor is the pedagogy established about how to teach it well. As a consequence, most students don’t learn in their classrooms what life is like on the job—and it shows.
Employers, says a U.S. Chamber of Commerce Foundation report, are “coping with new hires who are unsure of how to write a professional email, struggle to organize and prioritize tasks, or have a difficult time collaborating with coworkers.” A survey of more than 1,000 hiring managers by the Society for Human Resource Management yielded a similar finding: About one-third cited a lack of soft skills among candidates as the reason they had trouble filling positions.
One promising program has the potential to end the deadlock over the skills gap, satisfying employers while addressing the skeptics’ critique that companies skimp on training. Developed by the Federation for Advanced Manufacturing Education (FAME), this small-but-growing two-year apprenticeship-style program trains students to maintain and repair the machinery that now does most of the rote work of manufacturing. It has a unique curricular focus: As much as two-thirds of students’ time is spent on soft-skills development, while just one-third is devoted to technical training. The result is that graduates have excellent professional and collaborative skills, fulfilling employers’ needs. But it’s also successful enough to draw the kind of financial investment from companies that workers deserve. First launched at a single Toyota factory in 2010, it has already grown to involve more than 350 manufacturers in 13 states, from large refrigerator makers to smaller plastics plants. Of the roughly 850 students who have graduated so far, 85 percent have been hired by their sponsoring employers with starting salaries at $50,000 or more. And because the students don’t pay for their training, they can graduate debt free.
While few issues these days draw bipartisan consensus, politicians as diverse as Joe Biden, Bernie Sanders, and even Donald Trump agree on the need for more high-quality career and technical education opportunities in general, and apprenticeships in particular. FAME could be the kind of program to drive that consensus into action, for the benefit of both employers and workers.
Dennis Dio Parker, the founder of FAME, has grappled for decades with skills shortages, ever since his employer, Toyota, launched a factory in Georgetown, Kentucky, in 1987. Now employing 10,000 workers, it’s the largest Toyota plant in the world, but when it first opened, the factory had trouble finding enough qualified workers. “We needed workers qualified in skilled maintenance—maintaining the conveyor lines, the power to the buildings, the robots, the table lifters,” said Parker, whose job was to develop in-house training programs for Toyota. These workers also needed the problem-solving skills to figure out why a machine might be broken and how to fix it. In addition, they needed to be able to communicate and work closely with the engineering department and with each other. Unfortunately, Parker said, “not many people were passing the assessment tests.”
As Parker tinkered with new training curricula over the years, he interviewed dozens of supervisors about the skills their exceptional workers possessed and saw some common themes. “Technically, they’re highly competent, but they’re also great attenders,” Parker said. “We never worry about them missing. They have great initiative.” These workers also had great communications and people skills. Parker set out to train workers to perform like those exceptional employees. The program he ultimately developed was effective enough to draw the interest of other companies, whom he organized into a collaborative to disseminate the model. That collaborative became the Federation for Advanced Manufacturing Education, launched in 2010, and its signature program for technicians has since come to be known as FAME.
From week one, FAME makes clear that it’s not a traditional college program where students can get away with playing hooky or sit slouched in the back of class. At orientation, students receive a collared uniform shirt, which they’re expected to wear to class every day. This insistence on a uniform is actually part of the program’s soft-skills curriculum. “If you look professional, you’ll start to feel professional,” Parker said. Students also learn the program’s expectations about attendance—which is not to be on time, but to be early. Outside each classroom are attendance sheets with students’ names and a daily log of arrival times. Students are marked in green if they are 20 to 30 minutes early to class, while on-time arrivals are marked in yellow and tardies of even one minute past the start time are in pink or red. A single red mark is enough to warrant a warning; three tardies means dismissal from the program. The emphasis on attendance underscores how the world of work contrasts with that of school, Parker said. “Colleges do a terrible job of preparing their students for the rigor and discipline of being a good attender at work. You can have a student with a 4.0 [GPA] who misses classes from time to time, and from the college’s perspective, their attendance is perfect. But they’re still going to get fired in a heartbeat on the job.”
At the start of the program, students are introduced to the FAME’s signature pedagogical prop: laminated “pocket cards,” sized to fit in the pocket of a work shirt, that serve as crib sheets for core concepts. The first week of class, students receive two cards focused on “safety culture” and three cards on “professional behaviors.” As the program continues, they accumulate more cards, on communication skills, problem solving, “visual workplace organization,” and other skills specific to their future jobs as advanced manufacturing technicians (AMTs). They’re expected to memorize and be able to recite each card on command, and, ultimately, to apply the content in a real-life situation.
Each card includes a checklist of required behaviors or core concepts, in simple, direct language. The “AMT professional greeting” card, for example, lays out seven steps for how students are expected to greet each other. Step 1 is the “professional posture” (described on a separate card), followed by Step 2: “Greet the other person with a strong voice. Look in the eye.” The sequence ends with Step 7: “Tell them you are pleased to meet them and/or offer to help.”
Companies have reduced investment in worker training over the past 20 years, forcing employees to seek more training themselves at community and for-profit colleges, often going into debt to pay for it.
While these instructions might seem basic, they are often eye-openers for the 18- to 20-year-olds who make up the target demographic of the program, Parker said. “They have no context or life experience,” he told me. The program also drills students in public speaking. In FAME instructor Chris Lagemann’s classroom, for instance, at the State Technical College of Missouri, each class begins with a student delivering a presentation on shop floor safety, which the class critiques based on the checklists of do’s and don’ts spelled out on the pocket cards that define expectations for presentations. “They get evaluated on their posture and appearance,” Lagemann said. “Did they stand up straight, and were their hands in front? Were they fidgeting or standing still? Did they introduce themselves?” Lagemann keeps track of how many “um”s, “you know”s, and “like”s the presenter uses. Students run through this exercise twice a day, every day. “It’s a lot of repetition,” Lagemann said, but its purpose is to inculcate the skills laid out on the cards to a point of automaticity.
Unlike many other training programs, where students spend several weeks or even months in the classroom before an internship, FAME students spend three days each week on the shop floor immediately applying what they learned. Lagemann says he sends a weekly report to the employers sponsoring his students alerting them to that week’s lessons. “If there’s something in the plant that coincides or matches that discussion, they’ll try to have a job or assignment to practice those skills,” he said. “Likewise, if there’s something going on at the plant—if there’s a new installation or a shutdown of a particular piece of equipment—the manufacturers let us know that so we can cover that topic or have a 20-minute discussion of what’s going on.”
This close partnership between employers and FAME is a big reason why the program’s placement rates are so high. The sponsoring employers “match” with students at the start of the program and pay them a minimum of $14 an hour—enough to pay for tuition and living expenses. Instructors like Lagemann do their best to tailor the curriculum to employers’ specific needs, while a liaison at the company often serves as the student’s mentor, assigning work and communicating with instructors. “They’re taking on quite a bit of responsibility from an employer standpoint,” Lagemann said. “They’ve agreed to pay this kid 14-plus dollars an hour for two years; they’re going to train them, keep an eye on them, and assess them and hold them to the standards we expect.” But, he continued, employers “do get a two-year look to decide whether to give them a full-time job.” So far, the employers partnering with the program have decided that this level of investment is worth it—as have the students.
Before entering FAME, Glenn Dodge had attended one semester of college, with the goal of getting a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering. “I learned very quickly that it wasn’t the right fit,” he said. “I overburdened myself.” At age 19, he dropped out, bringing home thousands of dollars in school debt—but not the degree he’d been after. His stepmother, a guidance counselor at a local high school, pointed him toward FAME. In 2017, he enrolled in the program’s Missouri chapter.
Among other things, Dodge credits the program with transforming him from a “slightly shy” person into a confident public speaker serious about his work. “I stuttered a lot,” said Dodge, now 21. “I would throw in ‘uh’s and ‘um’s. I wouldn’t give a professional greeting. I would just start talking.” The program drastically improved his public speaking. “I learned to make eye contact rather than just read off a slide. I made sure people could hear me,” he said. Dodge’s sponsoring employer was a plastics manufacturer, where he had a mentor named Jason Cartwright. “He would bring me up into his office every now and then and just draw with Expo marker on his window to explain something,” Dodge said. “He made sure I understood what I was learning and could apply it.”
By the end of the program, Dodge was an excellent prospect for employers. After graduating in May 2019, he fielded four interview requests in one week, two of which turned into offers on the spot. He accepted a job working the third shift as a maintenance technician at Toyota Bodine, where his starting salary was $50,000 a year. He says he’ll have the loans from his aborted college career paid off in under five years. “I don’t understand why people still believe that they need a four-year degree to be a success,” he said. “AMT and the manufacturing field is where the lucrative money is at.”
One testament to FAME’s success is its ability to propel the careers of workers who, in other circumstances, might have far more trouble climbing the ranks. Camryn Vrbka, who enrolled in Missouri FAME’s inaugural cohort in 2015, is the rare woman in a relatively male-dominated field. “I liked engineering, and I liked solving problems, but I also found out I don’t do calculus for fun,” she said, by way of explaining why she didn’t enroll in a traditional college. She credits the FAME program with not only opening the door to a well-paid career but also boosting her up the ladder more quickly than she otherwise could have gone. She, like Dodge, has a job at Toyota Bodine, where she maintains and repairs machines that inject thousands of pounds of molten aluminum at high pressures into molds for engine parts. These machines, Vrbka said, are about two stories high and take about nine months to master. Yet Vrbka has already been promoted twice and, at just 21 years old, now holds the position of group leader, a job that typically requires 10 years of experience. “The next-youngest person at my level is at least five years older than me,” she says. Vrbka is also getting that four-year degree after all. She’s building on the associate’s degree she earned through FAME to get a bachelor’s in business administration, with tuition assistance from Toyota and FAME, in a recently added perk to the program. “She can go as far as she wants,” Nane Lawson, Toyota Bodine’s hiring manager and the advisory chair of Missouri FAME, told me.
While FAME’s target demographic is recent high school graduates, it has shown that it also can benefit older workers who want to “upskill” or “reskill” from different careers, such as ShuJuanna Johnson, a FAME trainee in Arkansas. Johnson, now 45, dropped out of high school when she became pregnant with her daughter. Although she eventually earned her GED, she found herself trapped in relatively unskilled work, including 15 years at a cleaning company pressing and folding shirts. “My primary job was to make sure the shirts were starched, make sure there were no spots or wrinkles,” she said. “It wasn’t taking me to the place in life where I wanted to be. It wasn’t a career. It was just a job, and I didn’t want to be living paycheck to paycheck.”
Johnson heard about FAME from counselors at a local community college, decided to apply, and was accepted. “I never had any experience with professional behaviors. I never even really thought about it,” she said. She credits the program with preparing her for a new work environment, as well as improving her time management and communication skills. Today, she is apprenticing at a Georgia-Pacific facility in Crossett, Arkansas, where she is learning to maintain and repair the machinery that manufactures tissues, paper towels, and other products. “It has really inspired me to do things that I never thought I could do,” she said.
So if FAME’s approach is so effective, why aren’t there already many more programs just like it?
One reason is that demand for soft skills from employers is relatively new. Another is that, although more schools are beginning to realize the importance of non-cognitive skills, teaching them isn’t yet a core part of most students’ formal education. K–12 and higher education still focus on academic achievement and technical knowledge, to the particular disadvantage of workers without four-year college degrees or lower-income backgrounds.
But even as more educators recognize the importance of soft skills, there’s still a final problem: how to define it and teach it. Definitional and pedagogical challenges abound. What exactly, for instance, is “leadership,” and how is it measured, let alone taught? While teaching and testing technical skills is relatively straightforward—a welding student, for example, either performs a sound weld or doesn’t—judging that same welder’s work habits and ability to get along with colleagues and superiors is much more nebulous and subjective. What FAME has managed to do is transform the squishy concept of soft skills into clear, practicable expectations for behavior and offer students plenty of opportunities for practice, assessment, and feedback.
While there has not yet been a formal evaluation of FAME, one indicator of its potential is the eagerness of employers to invest in the program. In the spring of 2020, more than 350 manufacturers were sponsoring trainees across a variety of sectors. In Missouri, the home of Glenn Dodge and Camryn Vrbka, participating employers include, in addition to Toyota Bodine, the leading commercial refrigerator maker True Manufacturing (“If you’ve ever gone to Walmart and gotten a soda out of the coolers, that’s a True refrigerator,” Lagemann, the FAME instructor, said); plastic-bottle manufacturer Alpha Packaging; and local concerns such as Component Bar Products, which creates custom machined parts for automotive and other industries; and C.A.P.S. Inc., a company that specializes in making plastic bottle caps for mustard and ketchup bottles and other food products. While the coronavirus pandemic has caused delays in some states for the 2020–21 FAME cohort, founder Dennis Dio Parker said employer interest has remained surprisingly stable, even despite the recession, and the program is working to adapt its format for the new realities of the post-pandemic world. If anything, Parker said, the pandemic could potentially prompt a renaissance of manufacturing in the United States as a result of supply-chain disruptions around the world. Such “in-shoring,” he said, could even prompt more interest from employers wanting workers trained to fill their needs.
Programs like FAME hold important lessons for the future of workforce training. First, training programs need to make the teaching of soft skills a priority, and FAME shows one way that can be done. Second, the success of the program’s apprenticeship-style format also reinforces the value of work-based learning, which deserves far greater attention and investment. Research has found that the career-focused programs producing the best results (as measured by higher wages, for example, and more consistent employment) are those that include work-based learning opportunities. FAME is a potentially powerful addition to that repertoire of programs, particularly for its ability to draw investment from employers and for its formalized soft-skills training. Its model is replicable in sectors beyond manufacturing, too. In fact, the Manufacturing Institute, which now runs the program, is already looking for other high-demand fields where a FAME-like program can be developed and launched. As the demand for soft skills continues to grow, innovative efforts like FAME will be increasingly important for ensuring that American industries and workers have what they need to compete in a global economy.


washingtonmonthly--2020-08-31--America’s Best Colleges for Student Voting 2020

On November 3 , Americans will vote in an election unlike any other in U.S. history .
As COVID-19 rages across the country , many will find themselves voting by mail for the first time .
Others will wait in long lines at the fewer polling places that are open because their state government has made voting by mail difficult or impossible .
If localities are imprudent about in-person voting—by having people line up indoors , for example—some will doubtlessly get sick as a result , leading to a terrible trade-off between political participation and physical health .
For even @ @ @ @ @ @ @ likely be a fraught and challenging process .
But for America ’ s college students , it will be especially perplexing .
Young people are , by definition , the age group least experienced with the act of voting .
Not coincidentally , they are also the ones least likely to cast ballots .
In 2018—a hard-fought , high-water mark for youth midterm voting—turnout among 18- to 29-year-olds was still only 35 percent , more than 10 points below the rate for 30- to 44-year-olds , 20 points below the rate for 45- @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the rate of the over-65 crowd .
Among college students , the rate was 40 percent—not much better .
The good news is that despite the pandemic , young people are unusually fired up about the 2020 contest .
A recent poll by Harvard ’ s Institute of Politics shows that more 18- to 29-year-olds say they plan to vote in 2020 than said they planned to vote when asked in surveys conducted at similar times in 2016 and 2018 .
It ’ s clear that recent events , such as the mass @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , have inspired many young people ’ s passions .
According to a poll by Tufts University ’ s Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement , 27 percent of 18- to 24-year-olds have attended a march or a demonstration in their lifetimes , a more than fivefold increase from 2016 .
A quarter of all 18- to 24-year-olds say they have registered someone else to vote , far more than in the past .
And while many people are worried that young Americans will be less likely to vote @ @ @ @ @ @ @ evidence suggests that ’ s not the case .
Compared to 2016 , the number of 18- to 24-year-olds who voted by mail in Florida ’ s 2020 presidential primary increased by 338 percent .
For all other age groups , the increase was just 11 percent .
The bad news is that many young Americans are still unsure about how to vote .
In the same Tufts survey , just 51 percent of respondents correctly knew whether they could register online .
Seven-and-a-half percent , which translates to 3.5 million people , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ internet , which inhibits their ability to both register and learn about the voting process .
And it is unclear if colleges will be able to keep large numbers of students on campus until November 3 , meaning that even the most well-informed students may wind up registering in places they ultimately can ’ t cast ballots .
At the Monthly , we believe that colleges have a special obligation to help young Americans become active political citizens .
It will help if they make sure students can be confident about where they @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to ensure that young people capitalize on their growing enthusiasm , schools will need to do much more .
They ’ ll need to explain how to register and what ’ s needed to actually cast a ballot , given both the pandemic-related election chaos and the growing maze of franchise restrictions in GOP-controlled states .
In other words , they will need to help make voting as easy as possible .
There are multiple resources universities can use to pursue this end .
The ALL IN Campus Democracy Challenge , for example @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to develop school-specific student voting action plans .
It has developed a virtual tool kit full of suggestions for how schools can use the internet to bolster registration and turnout during the pandemic , and it has created a Google group where colleges can share digital resources and ask questions .
The National Study of Learning , Voting , and Engagement ( NSLVE ) at Tufts University calculates registration numbers and turnout rates for participating campuses , allowing schools to track their progress .
To encourage schools to work at bettering turnout , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ NSLVE information to compile its fifth student voting honor roll .
The listed schools have met multiple criteria .
They have submitted an ALL IN action plan in 2018 and 2020 .
They ’ ve signed up to receive NSLVE data about their own campus registration and turnout rates .
And they ’ ve made both their 2016 and 2018 NSLVE data available to the public .
They have , in short , shown a repeated commitment to increasing student voting and have been transparent about the results .
This year , a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
This is 18 more schools than made the previous honor roll , released in February , and nearly twice the number that made the honor roll released last year .
Much as in the past , it ’ s an eclectic group .
Many prestigious , private four-year colleges perform well , but they are easily outnumbered by public two- and four-year institutions .
Some of America ’ s most famous schools didn ’ t make the cut .
The list relies on participation in programs such as ALL IN and NSLVE @ @ @ @ @ @ @ available for all institutions .
But to reward truly standout colleges , this year we ’ re ordering the honor roll by voter registration rate .
The top-performing school—the Maryland Institute College of Art , or MICA—receives its own distinction for having a registration rate above 95 percent .
The next eight schools are also specially demarcated for topping 85 percent .
Not all of these institutions performed so remarkably well in the past .
MICA , for example , increased its registration rate by more than 25 points between 2014 and 2018 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to quickly up their game if they work at it .
This means that administrators must incorporate registration and voting into their orientations ( digital or otherwise ) , and faculty must make a point of discussing it in their classes .
For schools struggling to figure out the best way to increase rates , the new Ask Every Student program by the National Resource Consortium on Full Student Voter Participation helps colleges devise plans to , quite literally , ask each of their students to register .
But for school employees , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ empowering students .
In everything from protests to registration drives , young Americans have proved that they are committed to making their voices heard in 2020 .
Some have already found ways to work through the voting challenges created by the pandemic .
Students in California ’ s Students Vote Project have discussed hopping onto Zoom lectures to encourage their peers to cast ballots .
It ’ s not difficult to see why they ’ re so enthusiastic .
The stakes of the upcoming election are monumental , and young people will have @ @ @ @ @ @ @ with the consequences .
They want to participate .
It ’ s imperative that colleges do everything they can to help .

On November 3, Americans will vote in an election unlike any other in U.S. history. As COVID-19 rages across the country, many will find themselves voting by mail for the first time. Others will wait in long lines at the fewer polling places that are open because their state government has made voting by mail difficult or impossible. If localities are imprudent about in-person voting—by having people line up indoors, for example—some will doubtlessly get sick as a result, leading to a terrible trade-off between political participation and physical health.
Check out the complete 2020 Washington Monthly rankings here.
For even the most seasoned voters, this will likely be a fraught and challenging process. But for America’s college students, it will be especially perplexing. Young people are, by definition, the age group least experienced with the act of voting. Not coincidentally, they are also the ones least likely to cast ballots. In 2018—a hard-fought, high-water mark for youth midterm voting—turnout among 18- to 29-year-olds was still only 35 percent, more than 10 points below the rate for 30- to 44-year-olds, 20 points below the rate for 45- to 64-year-olds, and less than half the rate of the over-65 crowd. Among college students, the rate was 40 percent—not much better.
The good news is that despite the pandemic, young people are unusually fired up about the 2020 contest. A recent poll by Harvard’s Institute of Politics shows that more 18- to 29-year-olds say they plan to vote in 2020 than said they planned to vote when asked in surveys conducted at similar times in 2016 and 2018. It’s clear that recent events, such as the mass activism against police brutality and institutionalized racism, have inspired many young people’s passions. According to a poll by Tufts University’s Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement, 27 percent of 18- to 24-year-olds have attended a march or a demonstration in their lifetimes, a more than fivefold increase from 2016. A quarter of all 18- to 24-year-olds say they have registered someone else to vote, far more than in the past. And while many people are worried that young Americans will be less likely to vote by mail than their elders, preliminary evidence suggests that’s not the case. Compared to 2016, the number of 18- to 24-year-olds who voted by mail in Florida’s 2020 presidential primary increased by 338 percent. For all other age groups, the increase was just 11 percent.
The bad news is that many young Americans are still unsure about how to vote. In the same Tufts survey, just 51 percent of respondents correctly knew whether they could register online. Seven-and-a-half percent, which translates to 3.5 million people, said they have poor access to the internet, which inhibits their ability to both register and learn about the voting process. And it is unclear if colleges will be able to keep large numbers of students on campus until November 3, meaning that even the most well-informed students may wind up registering in places they ultimately can’t cast ballots.
At the Monthly, we believe that colleges have a special obligation to help young Americans become active political citizens. It will help if they make sure students can be confident about where they will be on Election Day. But to ensure that young people capitalize on their growing enthusiasm, schools will need to do much more. They’ll need to explain how to register and what’s needed to actually cast a ballot, given both the pandemic-related election chaos and the growing maze of franchise restrictions in GOP-controlled states. In other words, they will need to help make voting as easy as possible.
There are multiple resources universities can use to pursue this end. The ALL IN Campus Democracy Challenge, for example, works with all kinds of colleges to develop school-specific student voting action plans. It has developed a virtual tool kit full of suggestions for how schools can use the internet to bolster registration and turnout during the pandemic, and it has created a Google group where colleges can share digital resources and ask questions. The National Study of Learning, Voting, and Engagement (NSLVE) at Tufts University calculates registration numbers and turnout rates for participating campuses, allowing schools to track their progress.
To encourage schools to work at bettering turnout, the Monthly has used ALL IN and NSLVE information to compile its fifth student voting honor roll. The listed schools have met multiple criteria. They have submitted an ALL IN action plan in 2018 and 2020. They’ve signed up to receive NSLVE data about their own campus registration and turnout rates. And they’ve made both their 2016 and 2018 NSLVE data available to the public. They have, in short, shown a repeated commitment to increasing student voting and have been transparent about the results.
This year, a total of 157 schools made the list. This is 18 more schools than made the previous honor roll, released in February, and nearly twice the number that made the honor roll released last year. Much as in the past, it’s an eclectic group. Many prestigious, private four-year colleges perform well, but they are easily outnumbered by public two- and four-year institutions. Some of America’s most famous schools didn’t make the cut.
The list relies on participation in programs such as ALL IN and NSLVE because raw turnout data isn’t available for all institutions. But to reward truly standout colleges, this year we’re ordering the honor roll by voter registration rate. The top-performing school—the Maryland Institute College of Art, or MICA—receives its own distinction for having a registration rate above 95 percent. The next eight schools are also specially demarcated for topping 85 percent. Not all of these institutions performed so remarkably well in the past. MICA, for example, increased its registration rate by more than 25 points between 2014 and 2018. It’s possible for schools to quickly up their game if they work at it.
This means that administrators must incorporate registration and voting into their orientations (digital or otherwise), and faculty must make a point of discussing it in their classes. For schools struggling to figure out the best way to increase rates, the new Ask Every Student program by the National Resource Consortium on Full Student Voter Participation helps colleges devise plans to, quite literally, ask each of their students to register.
But for school employees, much of the work really just involves empowering students. In everything from protests to registration drives, young Americans have proved that they are committed to making their voices heard in 2020. Some have already found ways to work through the voting challenges created by the pandemic. Students in California’s Students Vote Project have discussed hopping onto Zoom lectures to encourage their peers to cast ballots.
It’s not difficult to see why they’re so enthusiastic. The stakes of the upcoming election are monumental, and young people will have to live for longer than anyone else with the consequences. They want to participate. It’s imperative that colleges do everything they can to help.


washingtonmonthly--2020-08-31--Colleges Where Majors Popular with Black Students Pay Well

In the United States , there ’ s a direct correlation between the average earnings of a college major and what percentage of the major ’ s students are Black .
In the highest-paying disciplines—subjects such as computer science , chemical engineering , and finance—Black students are a significantly smaller share of recent graduates than they are nationwide ( in the case of those three , the share is below 5 percent , compared to a national share of roughly 10 percent ) .
For the lowest-paying majors , the opposite is true .
The subject with the highest share @ @ @ @ @ @ @ first-year average incomes that are tens of thousands of dollars less than finance , and roughly half of what computer science and chemical engineering students go on to earn .
There are many reasons for this correlation , ranging from high school segregation to the relative emphasis these subjects place on bringing about positive social change ( see Daniel Block , “ Why STEM Needs Social Justice , ” page 26 ) .
It has spurred intense efforts by both policymakers and many universities to graduate more people of color from high-paying fields @ @ @ @ @ @ @ financial well-being of these communities and for the social well-being of the United States .
But it ’ s also important that institutions respect the choices Black students make for themselves , and high-paying fields are far from the only ones worth studying .
Indeed , the fields that Black students disproportionately graduate from are essential to both day-to-day life and academic inquiry .
Without social workers , the U.S. safety net system would collapse .
Sociology leads to a plethora of worthy careers , from political advocacy to urban planning to sociological @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s critical that we work not just to graduate more Black students from STEM majors .
It means we need to figure out how to make sure the subjects more Black people already study lead to better-paying jobs .
To that end , the Washington Monthly has gathered newly available data from the Department of Education to examine at which specific colleges the majors ( or “ programs ” ) known for high Black enrollment , like social work , lead to above-average earnings .
We started by looking at the 38 most @ @ @ @ @ @ @ four with the largest share of recent Black graduates : health and medical administration ( 26.1 percent of recent graduates ) ; social work ( 22 percent ) ; criminal justice ( 20 percent ) ; and sociology ( 18.6 percent ) .
Next , to make sure we were working with a large enough sample size , we eliminated every school whose program graduated fewer than 50 students in the past two years and then , among these schools , calculated the median first-year earnings for each of the four programs .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ where the first-time , full-time undergraduate Black graduation rate is below 50 percent ( the graduation rate for these Black students nationwide is 40 percent ) to eliminate institutions that saddle most of their Black students with debt without providing any credentials .
To ensure that the graduation rate came from a large enough sample size to be meaningful , we took out every school that graduated fewer than 25 first-time , full-time Black students .
After that , we isolated the colleges where program graduates had above-average earnings relative to program graduates @ @ @ @ @ @ @ above-average share of Black students relative to its peers nationwide .
The result , displayed on page 50 , is a list of the schools where the majors in which Black students are most represented lead to well-paying jobs , and where we feel as confident as we can that they are sharing in the returns .
The outcome is somewhat depressing : There are not many programs that meet these thresholds .
You may notice , for example , that there ’ s no health and medical administration list .
That ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ program with above-average earnings and an above-average percentage of Black graduates has a Black graduation rate below 50 percent .
For social work and criminal justice , it is only slightly better : Of the 417 criminal justice programs that graduated at least 50 students , only eight make the list .
Only four of the 250 social work programs do .
Sociology is the sole major of the four that has more than 10 programs that meet the above criteria ( we have elected to list only the top 10 ) , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that the major is offered and popular at elite four-year schools .
For these top-performing programs , earnings on the whole are still significantly below what they are for high-paying fields .
Columbia University ’ s sociology program , the highest-earning one on this list , has a median earning well below that of most engineering programs .
None of the social work programs listed have first-year salaries that exceed $ 34,500—the median salary for recent college graduates nationwide .
Research shows that students who graduate with degrees in more traditional liberal arts @ @ @ @ @ @ @ catch up to their STEM peers in incomes .
But initial salaries are important , especially for students dealing with debt , so it ’ s distressing that none of these very worthwhile majors yields notably high immediate returns .
It is further evidence that there are structural problems with American politics , economics , and society that need to be addressed .
We seriously undervalue professions that prioritize helping others and the people of color who are overrepresented in their workforce .
( The two are likely related : The high percentages @ @ @ @ @ @ @ could well be part of why , on average , they pay less . )
Even in a far fairer economy , of course , these kinds of fields likely won ’ t pay as much right out of college as the hard sciences do , which typically demand more taxing , technical knowledge .
And to the extent that Black students are drawn to lower-paying fields to help fight structural oppression—for example , criminal justice majors are needed to help address mass incarceration—then the ultimate solution to this imbalance is eliminating systematic @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Black students to choose other fields , while also reducing barriers to graduating from those fields .
But , needless to say , dismantling racism is a lengthy task .
Until it happens , it ’ s especially critical that majors with high Black enrollment be more lucrative .
The good news is that they can be .
There are schools that graduate these students into well-paying jobs .
While none of the listed social work programs had earnings that exceeded $ 34,500 , all of the sociology and criminal justice programs did @ @ @ @ @ @ @ elite schools that made the cut .
Almost half of the institutions are open-access public schools .
Every social work program that appears is offered by a state school , and the only two nonselective institutions on the sociology list are public universities .
One of them , the University of Houston , has the highest share of Black graduates of any of the sociology programs , and its median earnings outpace several far more famous colleges .
It ’ s a positive sign that even less-selective institutions can help students in these @ @ @ @ @ @ @ college .
We were able to produce this list only because the Department of Education , after years of promises , finally released earnings data by specific school programs .
There ’ s no doubt that this is useful .
But it also has limits .
First , thus far , the department only provides information for two years of graduates—2015 and 2016 .
( To make sure we matched earnings with graduates , we measured the shares of Black graduates using the same years . )
Second , it only gives us @ @ @ @ @ @ @ year out of college .
It would be much more helpful if the department provided program-level earnings for classes that are multiple years , and ideally decades , out of school .
The relative paucity of information presents other constraints .
The Department of Education does not break down earnings data by race .
As a result , it is impossible for us to know if Black students are sharing equally in the above-median earnings .
Given that Black people make less than other Americans in the same fields and with the same @ @ @ @ @ @ @ likely that they are not .
( Our belief is that the relatively high share of Black graduates in these particular programs means that they are likely still enjoying some of the higher-than-average returns . )
In addition , the department does not provide program-level debt estimates that include family debt , meaning that researchers , including ourselves , can not accurately measure how much graduates of these programs owe lenders .
Given that people of color take on more debt on average than others , the government must determine and then release @ @ @ @ @ @ @ which programs are most financially helpful for minority communities .
Similarly , the proxy we used to determine Black graduation rates—first-time , full-time students—is imperfect because it does not capture returning or part-time students , of which Black people also make up a disproportionate percentage .
We used it anyway , because the Department of Education provides no part-time or returning student graduation data that is broken down by race .
It also doesn ’ t provide graduation rates broken down by each school ’ s particular programs .
To fully explore which @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Black students go into well-paying jobs , researchers need as much granular program-level data as possible that includes outcomes by race .
In theory , getting it should be straightforward : Congress must simply repeal a 2008 law that bans the government from being able to track by racial category students ’ outcomes after college .
There ’ s already a bipartisan collection of senators who support eliminating this prohibition .
In the meantime , the Department of Education can keep publishing data on program-level outcomes so we can see how graduates fare @ @ @ @ @ @ @ now , we hope that our findings more fully illustrate the unfortunate state of majors , race , and earnings— as well as provide some glimmers of hope .

In the United States, there’s a direct correlation between the average earnings of a college major and what percentage of the major’s students are Black. In the highest-paying disciplines—subjects such as computer science, chemical engineering, and finance—Black students are a significantly smaller share of recent graduates than they are nationwide (in the case of those three, the share is below 5 percent, compared to a national share of roughly 10 percent). For the lowest-paying majors, the opposite is true. The subject with the highest share of Black graduates—health and medical administration—leads to first-year average incomes that are tens of thousands of dollars less than finance, and roughly half of what computer science and chemical engineering students go on to earn.
Check out the complete 2020 Washington Monthly rankings here.
There are many reasons for this correlation, ranging from high school segregation to the relative emphasis these subjects place on bringing about positive social change (see Daniel Block, “Why STEM Needs Social Justice“). It has spurred intense efforts by both policymakers and many universities to graduate more people of color from high-paying fields.
These endeavors are important for the financial well-being of these communities and for the social well-being of the United States. But it’s also important that institutions respect the choices Black students make for themselves, and high-paying fields are far from the only ones worth studying. Indeed, the fields that Black students disproportionately graduate from are essential to both day-to-day life and academic inquiry. Without social workers, the U.S. safety net system would collapse. Sociology leads to a plethora of worthy careers, from political advocacy to urban planning to sociological research itself. This means it’s critical that we work not just to graduate more Black students from STEM majors. It means we need to figure out how to make sure the subjects more Black people already study lead to better-paying jobs.
To that end, the Washington Monthly has gathered newly available data from the Department of Education to examine at which specific colleges the majors (or “programs”) known for high Black enrollment, like social work, lead to above-average earnings. We started by looking at the 38 most popular majors in America and identifying the four with the largest share of recent Black graduates: health and medical administration (26.1 percent of recent graduates); social work (22 percent); criminal justice (20 percent); and sociology (18.6 percent). Next, to make sure we were working with a large enough sample size, we eliminated every school whose program graduated fewer than 50 students in the past two years and then, among these schools, calculated the median first-year earnings for each of the four programs. Then, we cut out all institutions where the first-time, full-time undergraduate Black graduation rate is below 50 percent (the graduation rate for these Black students nationwide is 40 percent) to eliminate institutions that saddle most of their Black students with debt without providing any credentials. To ensure that the graduation rate came from a large enough sample size to be meaningful, we took out every school that graduated fewer than 25 first-time, full-time Black students.
After that, we isolated the colleges where program graduates had above-average earnings relative to program graduates nationwide and where the program graduated an above-average share of Black students relative to its peers nationwide. The result is a list of the schools where the majors in which Black students are most represented lead to well-paying jobs, and where we feel as confident as we can that they are sharing in the returns.
The outcome is somewhat depressing: There are not many programs that meet these thresholds. You may notice, for example, that there’s no health and medical administration list. That’s because every health and medical administration program with above-average earnings and an above-average percentage of Black graduates has a Black graduation rate below 50 percent. For social work and criminal justice, it is only slightly better: Of the 417 criminal justice programs that graduated at least 50 students, only eight make the list. Only four of the 250 social work programs do. Sociology is the sole major of the four that has more than 10 programs that meet the above criteria (we have elected to list only the top 10), a relative abundance powered by the fact that the major is offered and popular at elite four-year schools.
For these top-performing programs, earnings on the whole are still significantly below what they are for high-paying fields. Columbia University’s sociology program, the highest-earning one on this list, has a median earning well below that of most engineering programs. None of the social work programs listed have first-year salaries that exceed $34,500—the median salary for recent college graduates nationwide. Research shows that students who graduate with degrees in more traditional liberal arts fields, like sociology, do eventually catch up to their STEM peers in incomes. But initial salaries are important, especially for students dealing with debt, so it’s distressing that none of these very worthwhile majors yields notably high immediate returns. It is further evidence that there are structural problems with American politics, economics, and society that need to be addressed. We seriously undervalue professions that prioritize helping others and the people of color who are overrepresented in their workforce. (The two are likely related: The high percentages of people of color in these industries could well be part of why, on average, they pay less.)
Even in a far fairer economy, of course, these kinds of fields likely won’t pay as much right out of college as the hard sciences do, which typically demand more taxing, technical knowledge. And to the extent that Black students are drawn to lower-paying fields to help fight structural oppression—for example, criminal justice majors are needed to help address mass incarceration—then the ultimate solution to this imbalance is eliminating systematic discrimination. Doing so might lead some Black students to choose other fields, while also reducing barriers to graduating from those fields.
But, needless to say, dismantling racism is a lengthy task. Until it happens, it’s especially critical that majors with high Black enrollment be more lucrative.
The good news is that they can be. There are schools that graduate these students into well-paying jobs. While none of the listed social work programs had earnings that exceeded $34,500, all of the sociology and criminal justice programs did. And it’s not just elite schools that made the cut. Almost half of the institutions are open-access public schools. Every social work program that appears is offered by a state school, and the only two nonselective institutions on the sociology list are public universities. One of them, the University of Houston, has the highest share of Black graduates of any of the sociology programs, and its median earnings outpace several far more famous colleges. It’s a positive sign that even less-selective institutions can help students in these majors get decent-paying jobs right out of college.
We were able to produce this list only because the Department of Education, after years of promises, finally released earnings data by specific school programs. There’s no doubt that this is useful. But it also has limits. First, thus far, the department only provides information for two years of graduates—2015 and 2016. (To make sure we matched earnings with graduates, we measured the shares of Black graduates using the same years.) Second, it only gives us such data for graduates who are one year out of college. It would be much more helpful if the department provided program-level earnings for classes that are multiple years, and ideally decades, out of school.
The relative paucity of information presents other constraints. The Department of Education does not break down earnings data by race. As a result, it is impossible for us to know if Black students are sharing equally in the above-median earnings. Given that Black people make less than other Americans in the same fields and with the same levels of education, it’s likely that they are not. (Our belief is that the relatively high share of Black graduates in these particular programs means that they are likely still enjoying some of the higher-than-average returns.)
In addition, the department does not provide program-level debt estimates that include family debt, meaning that researchers, including ourselves, cannot accurately measure how much graduates of these programs owe lenders. Given that people of color take on more debt on average than others, the government must determine and then release this information so we can better understand which programs are most financially helpful for minority communities. Similarly, the proxy we used to determine Black graduation rates—first-time, full-time students—is imperfect because it does not capture returning or part-time students, of which Black people also make up a disproportionate percentage. We used it anyway, because the Department of Education provides no part-time or returning student graduation data that is broken down by race. It also doesn’t provide graduation rates broken down by each school’s particular programs.
To fully explore which schools do the best job of helping Black students go into well-paying jobs, researchers need as much granular program-level data as possible that includes outcomes by race. In theory, getting it should be straightforward: Congress must simply repeal a 2008 law that bans the government from being able to track by racial category students’ outcomes after college. There’s already a bipartisan collection of senators who support eliminating this prohibition. In the meantime, the Department of Education can keep publishing data on program-level outcomes so we can see how graduates fare several years after college.
But for now, we hope that our findings more fully illustrate the unfortunate state of majors, race, and earnings—as well as provide some glimmers of hope.


washingtonmonthly--2020-08-31--America’s Best Bang for the Buck Colleges

The coronavirus pandemic and the resulting economic crisis have made colleges ’ role in enhancing social mobility more important than ever .
Typically , during recessions , more Americans enroll in colleges and universities in an effort to boost their job prospects .
We may not see enrollments increase until after the public health crisis passes—which could take a year or two—but millions of Americans are doubtlessly thinking ahead to what colleges can do for them .
For the ninth year , we produced a ranking of Best Bang for the Buck colleges , which is laser focused on showing @ @ @ @ @ @ @ social mobility—and which don ’ t .
The rankings are broken down by region , beginning on page 52 .
( We used the same data and methodology to create the social mobility portion of the main rankings , which begin on page 62 ; the methodology is explained on page 106 . )
We had to use the same data for median earnings and student loan repayment rates as last year , as the U.S. Department of Education did not update college-level data in the College Scorecard this year .
Hopefully the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ important information with the public going forward .
The Best Bang for the Buck colleges across each of the five regions are a mix of some of America ’ s most elite institutions and hidden gems with strong student outcomes and a commitment to upward mobility .
In the Northeast , four Ivy League universities and MIT are joined in the top 10 by Goddard College , the Massachusetts Maritime Academy , Bentley University , the City University of New York ’ s Baruch College , and Rutgers University–Newark .
At Baruch College @ @ @ @ @ @ @ at essentially the same rate as their wealthier peers .
And the cost of attending is reasonable ; for a student from a household earning less than $ 75,000 , Baruch has a net price of $ 2,789 per year .
This is what an engine of social mobility looks like .
In the South and Midwest , Berea College and College of the Ozarks maintain their consistently high rankings thanks to their economic diversity , relatively strong graduation rates , and commitment to meeting students ’ financial need .
Public universities do @ @ @ @ @ @ @ University of Illinois campuses in Chicago and Urbana-Champaign landing within the top five in the Midwest and Texas A & M ’ s College Station and Texarkana campuses joining the University ofTexas–Rio Grande Valley in the top five .
More than half of UT–Rio Grande Valley students are the first in their families to attend college , and the average net price is just $ 3,298 per year .
In the Southeast , Georgetown University and Washington and Lee take the top two spots again this year , reflecting the fact that they @ @ @ @ @ @ @ But combined , they only graduated 262 Pell recipients last year—about a fifth of the number that graduated from seventh-ranked Florida International University , where nearly half of the students are first generation .
Finally , in the West , the California State University system continues to dominate the region .
Fourteen of the top 23 colleges in the West are Cal State campuses , with Stanislaus taking the top spot this year .
The University of Washington ’ s Tacoma campus and Utah State University also maintained their traditional spots in the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ top 50 colleges in print .
Online , we list the full 200-plus colleges per region .
Toward the bottom of those rankings , we find a mix of middling public and private nonprofit colleges along with a number of for-profit college chains .
In a time when students and their families are balking at paying high tuition prices for mediocre student outcomes , many of these colleges will struggle and may be forced to change their behavior or risk going out of business .
But not all of them .
Liberty University @ @ @ @ @ @ @ danger of closing , thanks to its billion-dollar endowment and around 100,000 students attending online , but their net price of $ 25,272 and 44 percent eight-year graduation rate result in them being ranked 262nd of 278 colleges in the Southeast .
They can—and must—do better .

The coronavirus pandemic and the resulting economic crisis have made colleges’ role in enhancing social mobility more important than ever. Typically, during recessions, more Americans enroll in colleges and universities in an effort to boost their job prospects. We may not see enrollments increase until after the public health crisis passes—which could take a year or two—but millions of Americans are doubtlessly thinking ahead to what colleges can do for them.
Check out the complete 2020 Washington Monthly rankings here.
For the ninth year, we produced a ranking of Best Bang for the Buck colleges, which is laser focused on showing which colleges do a good job promoting social mobility—and which don’t. The rankings are broken down by region, beginning on page 52. (We used the same data and methodology to create the social mobility portion of the main rankings, which begin on page 62; the methodology is explained on page 106.) We had to use the same data for median earnings and student loan repayment rates as last year, as the U.S. Department of Education did not update college-level data in the College Scorecard this year. Hopefully the federal government will continue to share this important information with the public going forward.
The Best Bang for the Buck colleges across each of the five regions are a mix of some of America’s most elite institutions and hidden gems with strong student outcomes and a commitment to upward mobility. In the Northeast, four Ivy League universities and MIT are joined in the top 10 by Goddard College, the Massachusetts Maritime Academy, Bentley University, the City University of New York’s Baruch College, and Rutgers University–Newark. At Baruch College, low-income students with Pell Grants graduate at essentially the same rate as their wealthier peers. And the cost of attending is reasonable; for a student from a household earning less than $75,000, Baruch has a net price of $2,789 per year. This is what an engine of social mobility looks like.
In the South and Midwest, Berea College and College of the Ozarks maintain their consistently high rankings thanks to their economic diversity, relatively strong graduation rates, and commitment to meeting students’ financial need. Public universities do well in both regions, with the University of Illinois campuses in Chicago and Urbana-Champaign landing within the top five in the Midwest and Texas A&M’s College Station and Texarkana campuses joining the University ofTexas–Rio Grande Valley in the top five. More than half of UT–Rio Grande Valley students are the first in their families to attend college, and the average net price is just $3,298 per year.
In the Southeast, Georgetown University and Washington and Lee take the top two spots again this year, reflecting the fact that they serve their lower-income students exceptionally well. But combined, they only graduated 262 Pell recipients last year—about a fifth of the number that graduated from seventh-ranked Florida International University, where nearly half of the students are first generation. Finally, in the West, the California State University system continues to dominate the region. Fourteen of the top 23 colleges in the West are Cal State campuses, with Stanislaus taking the top spot this year. The University of Washington’s Tacoma campus and Utah State University also maintained their traditional spots in the top 10.
We only display the top 50 colleges in print. Online, we list the full 200-plus colleges per region. Toward the bottom of those rankings, we find a mix of middling public and private nonprofit colleges along with a number of for-profit college chains. In a time when students and their families are balking at paying high tuition prices for mediocre student outcomes, many of these colleges will struggle and may be forced to change their behavior or risk going out of business. But not all of them. Liberty University, for example, is in no danger of closing, thanks to its billion-dollar endowment and around 100,000 students attending online, but their net price of $25,272 and 44 percent eight-year graduation rate result in them being ranked 262nd of 278 colleges in the Southeast. They can—and must—do better.


washingtonmonthly--2020-08-31--Biden Needs Bigger (Smarter) Ideas

Biden Needs Bigger (Smarter) Ideas

Joe Biden enters the final two months of the 2020 campaign about as well positioned ideologically as any Democratic presidential nominee in decades .
Over the summer he and Bernie Sanders negotiated a set of policy positions in which the former vice president moved to the left on everything from climate change to immigration .
But he conspicuously stopped short of signing on to the most controversial “ big ideas ” of his socialist rival , such as Medicare for All and decriminalizing illegal border crossings .
This new agenda , because it ’ s been blessed by Sanders and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to hold their noses and vote for Biden .
It also makes it harder for Donald Trump to persuade wavering Republicans and Independents that Biden is a tool of the extreme left .
That—plus the smoldering ruin Trump has made of the country—should , with luck , be enough to secure the White House and a Senate majority for the Democrats .
But even Biden ’ s Pretty Darned Progressive agenda will be no match for the catastrophic situation he and the Democrats will inherit should they win back power .
The young @ @ @ @ @ @ @ primaries weren ’ t wrong that America needs root-to-branch change , not marginal reform .
And that was before the killing of George Floyd focused the nation ’ s attention on its deep and abiding racial injustices in ways not seen since the civil rights era .
It was also before Trump ’ s bungled management of the pandemic created 1930s-level mass unemployment .
These huge , intertwined crises will present Biden , if he wins , with the responsibility , and possibly the opportunity , to enact much bolder changes than he @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , what are the big ideas he should pursue ?
Certainly not the ones Sanders himself couldn ’ t sell .
Remember how , during the debates , the more Sanders argued for Medicare for All , the more its political flaws became obvious—that it would require huge new taxes on the middle class and take away private health insurance for 150 million Americans , all on the promise that most people would come out ahead ?
Instead , on health care , Biden should champion a smarter big idea , one this @ @ @ @ @ @ @ All ” : In a nutshell , the federal government would set uniform ( and generally lower ) prices for all medical procedures .
Doing so is the single best way to discipline our increasingly costly , monopolized , predatory , and discriminatory health care system .
It could also deliver lower out-of-pocket health care costs to voters , with no tax increases , before the 2024 elections .
On higher education , Biden needs a similarly smarter big idea than the one Sanders has been peddling , universal free public college .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ federal money into states to allow their public universities to charge zero tuition , regardless of the different amounts those states currently spend on higher education .
But that would unjustly reward states ( mostly red ones ) that currently underinvest in their public college systems , while penalizing other states ( mostly blue ones ) that provide more generous subsidies to keep tuition low .
It would also direct comparatively more funds to elite flagship universities that disproportionately serve upper-middle-class whites , while shortchanging under-resourced open-access colleges that cater to lower-income and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Kevin Carey lays out a better big idea to transform higher education while avoiding these flaws ( “ How to Save Higher Education , ” page 30 ) .
Under Carey ’ s plan , individual colleges ( not states ) would be offered a direct annual federal subsidy of $ 10,000 per full-time student .
In exchange , they ’ d have to offer free college tuition to students with an annual household income below $ 75,000 , meet minimum standards for graduation rates and post-graduation earning , and accept credits from @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , including from online classes .
While not every college would take the deal , hundreds around the country probably would , since most Americans attend colleges where the revenue per full-time student is less than $ 10,000 .
Participating schools would have plenty of extra money to invest in better outcomes .
( As Jamaal Abdul-Alim reports in “ Higher Ed ’ s Most Successful Failure , ” page 36 , there are already proven ways of achieving those outcomes . )
And the requirement to share credits would create strong incentives @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to improve student success rates .
If he is going to meet the demands of this moment in history , Biden will ( like FDR ) have to govern more ambitiously as president than he is running as a candidate .
This magazine will continue to try to fashion the big-but-smart ideas he ’ ll need .
But first , of course , he has to win .

Joe Biden enters the final two months of the 2020 campaign about as well positioned ideologically as any Democratic presidential nominee in decades. Over the summer he and Bernie Sanders negotiated a set of policy positions in which the former vice president moved to the left on everything from climate change to immigration. But he conspicuously stopped short of signing on to the most controversial “big ideas” of his socialist rival, such as Medicare for All and decriminalizing illegal border crossings.
This new agenda, because it’s been blessed by Sanders and other progressives, gives left-leaning Democrats reason to hold their noses and vote for Biden. It also makes it harder for Donald Trump to persuade wavering Republicans and Independents that Biden is a tool of the extreme left. That—plus the smoldering ruin Trump has made of the country—should, with luck, be enough to secure the White House and a Senate majority for the Democrats.
But even Biden’s Pretty Darned Progressive agenda will be no match for the catastrophic situation he and the Democrats will inherit should they win back power. The young voters who rallied around Sanders during the primaries weren’t wrong that America needs root-to-branch change, not marginal reform. And that was before the killing of George Floyd focused the nation’s attention on its deep and abiding racial injustices in ways not seen since the civil rights era. It was also before Trump’s bungled management of the pandemic created 1930s-level mass unemployment.
These huge, intertwined crises will present Biden, if he wins, with the responsibility, and possibly the opportunity, to enact much bolder changes than he has dared contemplate. The question is, what are the big ideas he should pursue?
Certainly not the ones Sanders himself couldn’t sell. Remember how, during the debates, the more Sanders argued for Medicare for All, the more its political flaws became obvious—that it would require huge new taxes on the middle class and take away private health insurance for 150 million Americans, all on the promise that most people would come out ahead?
Instead, on health care, Biden should champion a smarter big idea, one this magazine has dubbed “Medicare Prices for All”: In a nutshell, the federal government would set uniform (and generally lower) prices for all medical procedures. Doing so is the single best way to discipline our increasingly costly, monopolized, predatory, and discriminatory health care system. It could also deliver lower out-of-pocket health care costs to voters, with no tax increases, before the 2024 elections.
On higher education, Biden needs a similarly smarter big idea than the one Sanders has been peddling, universal free public college. The Sanders plan would essentially pump enough federal money into states to allow their public universities to charge zero tuition, regardless of the different amounts those states currently spend on higher education. But that would unjustly reward states (mostly red ones) that currently underinvest in their public college systems, while penalizing other states (mostly blue ones) that provide more generous subsidies to keep tuition low. It would also direct comparatively more funds to elite flagship universities that disproportionately serve upper-middle-class whites, while shortchanging under-resourced open-access colleges that cater to lower-income and minority students.
In this issue, Kevin Carey lays out a better big idea to transform higher education while avoiding these flaws (“How to Save Higher Education,” page 30). Under Carey’s plan, individual colleges (not states) would be offered a direct annual federal subsidy of $10,000 per full-time student. In exchange, they’d have to offer free college tuition to students with an annual household income below $75,000, meet minimum standards for graduation rates and post-graduation earning, and accept credits from every other college that takes this deal, including from online classes.
While not every college would take the deal, hundreds around the country probably would, since most Americans attend colleges where the revenue per full-time student is less than $10,000. Participating schools would have plenty of extra money to invest in better outcomes. (As Jamaal Abdul-Alim reports in “Higher Ed’s Most Successful Failure,” page 36, there are already proven ways of achieving those outcomes.) And the requirement to share credits would create strong incentives for colleges to cooperate with each other to improve student success rates.
The end result, Carey writes,
would be a new network of affordable, well-resourced, deeply interconnected colleges and universities that combine the virtues of traditional higher education diversity and autonomy with consumer protection, information technology, and cutting-edge education practice. Instead of letting some colleges collapse into bankruptcy while the rest struggle and claw in a failed system of free market chaos and declining public support, some of the most vital and distinctly American institutions in our nation’s history would be repositioned for even greater success.
If he is going to meet the demands of this moment in history, Biden will (like FDR) have to govern more ambitiously as president than he is running as a candidate. This magazine will continue to try to fashion the big-but-smart ideas he’ll need.
But first, of course, he has to win.