09/19/2022 10:00 AM EDT
With help from Nick Niedzwiadek
MOTOWN MOTIVATION: The AFL-CIO is teaming up with the Chris Gardner Foundation to launch a new program in Detroit this week aimed at getting more high school students from underserved communities — Black men, among others — into apprenticeship and pre-apprenticeship programs in the building trades or automotive industries.
Previewed first for POLITICO, the pilot will be expanded to other cities across the country — including Los Angeles, Austin and New York — over the next few months.
The recently enacted infrastructure bill “has resources in there for apprenticeship programs,” and it’s “tied into affirmative action,” AFL-CIO Secretary-Treasurer Fred Redmond told Weekly Shift. But “it’s labor’s responsibility to go into those communities and help them recruit.”
Union officials and Gardner, whose story inspired the movie “The Pursuit of Happyness,” will make presentations at local high schools where teachers will then recommend a core group of students. Those who end up participating will be matched with a mentor, and required to maintain a certain GPA and complete pre-apprenticeship curriculum set by founding partner North America’s Building Trades Unions.
“Our job is to let them know that they can and put them on a career path that can change their lives,” Gardner told Weekly Shift.
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