Career and technical education (CTE) and apprenticeship share many common goals, combining workplace skills with academic knowledge. Yet, CTE and Registered Apprenticeship (RA) Programs have historically been separate systems in the United States. This began to shift a decade ago with public and philanthropic investment in youth apprenticeship programs. This report examines the available, although limited, data from emerging high-school-based (HS-based) RA programs to see how they align with and could better serve CTE programming and goals. With further alignment, CTE-based apprenticeships can become a scalable model serving the goals and students of both systems.

Why This Matters

As governments increase investment in youth apprenticeship programs and school districts face mounting pressure to deliver both academic and workforce outcomes for young people, HS-based RA programs are emerging as a promising solution. Critical questions remain regarding how these programs are designed, where they thrive, who they serve, and what it takes to scale them effectively.

What We Found

High-school-based apprenticeships are small, but the number of new programs and apprentices roughly doubled between 2021 and 2022, bringing the total number of apprentices since 2015 to 2,843. CTE programs are longer standing and larger scale, with 2.8 million high-school CTE concentrators in 2022. Although CTE programs are national, five states account for two-thirds of HS-based apprentices.

CTE programs serve a more racially, ethnically, and gender-diverse population than HS-based apprenticeships. These differences may be partially explained by the programs’ geographical and occupational composition. HS-based apprenticeships are predominately focused in two industries—71 percent of HS-based apprentices are in construction or advanced manufacturing—while CTE concentrators more evenly span industries including health care, agriculture, and management. Our analysis of three sectors shows the following:

• Compared with HS-based apprenticeships, CTE programs serve a greater share of Latino students across sectors, and significantly more women in advanced manufacturing and digital technology. Women comprise over two-thirds of health care CTE and apprenticeship students.
• HS-based apprentices are concentrated in one or two occupational subclusters in each sector.
• Starting wages of HS-based apprentices vary by industry but are close to mean hourly wages of $11.22 per hour.

To further align CTE programs and HS-based apprenticeships, we recommend the following:

• Expand HS-based apprenticeship into more occupations to more closely reflect occupations popular in CTE.
• Recruit a more diverse population of apprentices. Many employers are interested in diversifying their workforce through apprenticeship, and CTE programs appear positioned to help.
• Deepen the career experiences of CTE concentrators, who take as few as two courses in one program of study. HS-based apprenticeships offer at least 2,000 hours of on-the-job experience, with the median program offering 4,000 hours.
• Explore creating CTE-based apprenticeships. HS-based apprenticeships housed within CTE centers can serve the goals and students of both systems.
• Improve research by identifying youth apprenticeships in RA datasets, integrating HS-based apprenticeships and CTE programs into statewide longitudinal data systems, and tracking how HS-based apprenticeships support state work-based learning goals.

How We Did It

We identified high-school-based programs in the Department of Labor’s Registered Apprenticeship Partners Information Database System by constraining the parameters to 16- to 19-year-olds without a high school degree and using a variety of search terms in several key fields. We then manually reviewed entries to determine high-school status. This approach of combining systemic searches with judgment calls for individual cases is the only method currently available for identifying high-school-based programs. Our CTE data are primarily drawn from the National Enrollment Profile by the Perkins Collaborative Resource Network.