By Edmond Ortiz
San Antonio city officials hope that 2026 will see more local businesses take advantage of a federally funded program designed to boost the number of available registered apprentices.
What is happening
Representatives with the city’s workforce development office have said they want to shine a light on their Registered Apprenticeship Program, where participants can earn competitive wages while learning specific skills that are desired in growing or emerging industries.
Program participants can also gain industry-recognized certifications, and develop relationships with employers in route to formulating a strong career track.
The local program is supported by a $3 million grant awarded by the U.S. Department of Labor’s Apprenticeships Building America program, which was launched by President Biden. The grant funding expires in June 2026.
Sonya Bryant, workforce development manager, said having registered apprentices is a proven workforce development model that revolves around the classical functions of job training and related classroom instructions.
“Just think old school. It’s the way information was transferred and how knowledge was transferred from one generation to the other,” Bryant said. “We’re trying to get back to that out here in San Antonio.”
Bryant said, historically, apprentices have been typically linked to manufacturing industries. But now there is an increasing demand for registered apprentices in non-traditional sectors such as social services, health care, and education.
City officials said they are using the remaining time and grant money to further promote the local RAP to local small-to-midsized businesses and organizations that could benefit from having registered apprentices.
The city’s workforce development office helps partnering employers with related paperwork to develop a new apprentice program or enhance an existing apprenticeship. City representatives said a RAP can especially aid small businesses with hard-to-fill positions or those doing succession planning for a large percentage of employees who are nearing retirement.
“An apprenticeship is probably one of the fastest ways an individual can get into a career pathway,” Bryant said. “It gives them access to benefits and better wages. There are educational components attached to it, too, so it’s not just them going through a trade school. There are degrees, certificates and benchmarks associated with apprenticeship.”
The length of time someone is training as an apprentice depends on the employer and their needs. Health care, construction and manufacturing are among the biggest industries in need of skilled workers and could benefit the most from having registered apprentices, according to city officials.
“Manufacturing is one of the hotter sectors with regards to current need, as well as a lot of the newer businesses that are coming to the region that are in manufacturing, specifically down on the South Side,” said Joel Morgan, workforce development office director.
“Apprenticeships can be a way to upskill current individuals that are working, give them a pathway to maybe a higher wage or opportunity, or just giving them access to get into it.”
The Registered Apprenticeship Program is also directly linked to the city’s Ready to Work, the locally funded education and job placement program.
Employers and employees that are reaping benefits
The city’s workforce development is communicating with private employers such as England-based JCB to participate in San Antonio’s Registered Apprenticeship Program. JCB announced in 2023 that it was building a 720,000-square-foot construction vehicle manufacturing facility on the South Side.
JCB will look to hire 1,500 workers over time for the new facility, and company officials are fans of the city’s RAP, according to city representatives. The city has so far created more than 15 registered apprenticeship partnerships with local employers.
ArcLight Medical, a medical management company, will start training apprentices early in the new year. Pete Kosko, ArcLight’s CEO, recalled how his firm had a shortage of EMS employees during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, and recognized that to ensure they could fill the gap with qualified talent, they would best be served by creating their own training program.
ArcLight is now focused on connecting with people who have gone through layoffs in other industries, and help them find meaningful employment in health care. The company provides entry level training for individuals who want to get into the medical field. This is key because San Antonio has a shortage of about 200 qualified, trained EMTs, Kosko said.
“We have five core trainings: EMT basic, EMT advanced, phlebotomy technician, EKG technician and mental health technician,” Kosko said. “These are all much needed careers in the medical field, but the training also allows them to gain experience and then hopefully move on and progress into being a paramedic or something else in the medical field.”
According to Kosko, having a registered apprentice program not only can help small employers to better fill staffing gaps, but it can provide more confidence to job seekers who are struggling to make ends meet.
“This is a great way for people to move up in economic mobility because you get a two-person household at entry level EMT basic and you’re making well over the median household income in San Antonio. That becomes housing affordability,” Kosko said.
Municipal departments within San Antonio’s city government are also taking advantage of the city’s Registered Apprenticeship Program.
Walter Barrett, safety, reliability and quality assurance chief for the city’s solid waste management department, said the department had struggled in the mid-2010s to fill multiple job vacancies.
Department leaders developed a long-term, internal recruitment and retention strategy, which has proven even more successful with the addition of the city’s RAP program.
Overall, the solid waste management department has hired hundreds of people since 2018 as a result of the recruitment and retention strategy. The department has hired nearly 200 RAP participants.
One of those past program participants, Tayler Lang, secured a commercial driver’s license and trained to operate a side loader garbage truck.
Lang said she initially did not have specific expectations coming into the apprentice training program. She, like other trainees, was put into the seat of a simulated automated collection service trainer. She got familiar with the many buttons and other controls that side loader drivers face every time they hit the road and pick up customers’ trash bins.
“It was nerve-wracking in the beginning,” Lang said. “Once you get into an actual truck and start driving, it isn’t nerve-wracking anymore. It was a slow and easy progression.”
“We have one-on-one training,” Barrett said, adding that every trainee is carefully guided by seasoned department veterans every step of the way. “You’re not in it by yourself. Everyone will learn differently.”
Lang has been driving a side loader for the city’s solid waste management department for nearly two years. She is now at a point where helping to teach other aspiring employees how to operate a garbage truck.
Lang said participating in the city’s Registered Apprenticeship Program has provided her with new, marketable skills and positive professional experiences.
“I don’t know what the future holds. We’ll see where this career path takes me,” she added.
