Political Quotes

“Mr. Speaker, this is National Apprenticeship Week and a good time to celebrate the renewed attention that apprenticeships have received from the Committee on Education and the Workforce and this administration. Apprenticeships are a centuries-old workforce development tool referenced as far back as the Bible. Nothing can prepare a student quite like the on-the-job experience, and apprenticeships are a tried and true method of preparing students to enter the workforce with the skills they need to succeed. We have a national skills gap with more than 7 million unfilled jobs in the country, and, for the seventh month running, the number of job openings has exceeded job seekers nationwide. A recent survey of U.S. employers showed that nearly half of all job creators struggle to hire employees with the right skills for the job, and, for the sixth year running, skilled trade jobs continue to be the hardest positions to fill all over the world. Apprenticeships are a wonderful solution to closing the skills gap and strengthening the workforce. We at the Committee on Education and the Workforce recognize this, and we have worked hard this Congress to make skills-based education a viable and valuable path for American workers. Over the course of the 115th Congress, we have made historic progress strengthening our workforce development efforts.…”