Early Education Apprenticeship Program Celebrated During Massachusetts Apprenticeship Week
Neighborhood Villages, in partnership with the Massachusetts Executive Office of Labor and Workforce and City of Boston, launched the program one year ago to help address early education workforce crisis
BOSTON, MA (November 14, 2023) - Neighborhood Villages — a Boston-based nonprofit that advocates for solutions to the greatest challenges faced by the early education sector — is celebrating one full year of its Early Childhood Education (ECE) Registered Apprenticeship Program, as Massachusetts marks National Apprenticeship Week (November 12-18, 2023).
Neighborhood Villages launched the initiative in November, 2022 with philanthropic support from the Wellington Management Foundation, Lynch Foundation, and Highland Street Foundation as well as a $1 million grant from the City of Boston. With funding from the Massachusetts Executive Office of Labor and Workforce Development, which was announced in January 2023, Neighborhood Villages expanded and extended its Apprenticeship Program, which offers non-college, accessible pathways to those entering or looking to advance their careers in the field of early education and care. The program offers on-the-job training, mentorship, wage bumps, and credentials to participants along two credentialing tracks: one for those seeking to become Lead Teachers and another for those seeking to become Directors.
Neighborhood Villages operates the largest Registered ECE Apprenticeship program in Massachusetts. Its program for aspiring ECE directors is the second only program in the country. Thus far, 89 early educators have participated in the program.
“As we work to fix the broken child care system in Massachusetts, recruiting and retaining quality teachers is critical to families’ ability to enroll their children in quality early education programs,” said Lauren Kennedy, Co-President of Neighborhood Villages. “The enthusiasm and demand we’ve seen among early educators enrolling in the Registered Apprenticeship Program shows that these opportunities are critical to building the early childhood education workforce and a talent pipeline. Thanks to support from the Executive Office of Workforce and Labor Development and City of Boston, Neighborhood Villages has been able to scale the program statewide and offer apprenticeship opportunities to educators across the Commonwealth.”
The Registered Apprenticeship program aims to address a full-blown workforce crisis for the ECE sector in Massachusetts and across the country, which was accelerated by the COVID-19 pandemic. Nationally, the United States is still missing nearly 40,000 of early educators who were previously in the field. In Massachusetts, the child care sector continues to face a staffing crisis, as the educator turnover rate is 27% across all centers in the state and there are more than 2,000 open teacher positions statewide. Without the ability to retain teachers, many providers have been forced to close entire classrooms, exacerbating access challenges for families.
“As we address Massachusetts’ workforce crisis in the early childhood education sector, we must build accessible pathways for opportunities including career advancement and increased compensation for early childhood educators,” said Massachusetts Secretary of Labor and Workforce Development Lauren Jones. “The Healey-Driscoll Administration appreciates our partnership with Neighborhood Villages, delivering an innovative tool and serving as the largest Registered Apprenticeship program of its kind in the Commonwealth. Through this initiative and more collaborative efforts like this we will meet the moment to prepare the workers we need today and for the future.”
One hundred percent of first-year participants in the Neighborhood Villages Registered Apprenticeship ECE Program reported that the program fully met their individual learning needs. One apprentice reported, “I love that this course was so accessible- remote, once a week, free, open to all, etc.” Another stated, “It's giving me the knowledge and information that I need to get my certificate without having to take college courses.”
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About Neighborhood Villages
Neighborhood Villages, founded in 2017 by Lauren Kennedy and Sarah Muncey, is a Boston-based systems-change non-profit that advocates for early education and care policy reform and implements scalable solutions that address the biggest challenges facing providers and the families who rely on them. For more information, visit https://www.neighborhoodvillages.org/our-work.
