Home / Education / MA Community Colleges Launch Paid Apprenticeship Degrees
MA Community Colleges Launch Paid Apprenticeship Degrees
12 Mar
Summary
- Apprenticeship degrees allow students to earn money while gaining skills.
- Programs currently train nurses, medical assistants, and educators.
- Over 30 employers, including Mass General Brigham, partner with colleges.
Massachusetts community colleges are seeing great success with their new apprenticeship degree programs, which offer students the chance to earn money while gaining practical skills and knowledge in their chosen fields. These programs are proving popular and are considered a long-overdue development in workforce training.
Currently, these degrees prepare students for roles as licensed practical nurses, medical assistants, behavioral health technicians, and K-12 educators. Future offerings are planned for early education, cybersecurity, surgical technologists, social work, medical laboratory technology, dental assisting, and allied health occupations.
More than 30 employers, including major healthcare systems and school districts, are partners in this initiative. The program's startup costs are supported by approximately $6 million in grants from the Richard and Susan Smith Family Foundation and Accelerate the Future. A statewide project manager has also been funded to oversee these registered apprenticeships across all 15 community colleges.
Governor Maura Healey has emphasized the importance of apprenticeships in the state's workforce strategy, setting a goal to register 100,000 apprentices in fields like healthcare and technology over the next decade.
