Opportunity Cost

Social Finance offers no-interest loans as a financial bridge for low-income workers who want to advance in healthcare. Also, a new ballot initiative in Colorado is a test of public support for short-term credential funding, a roundup of the latest on apprenticeship in its moment of truth, and an essay on why childcare providers should be empowered to fix their crumbling system. (Subscribe here.)

Making Up for Lost Time

Money isn’t the only barrier Americans face when they pursue short-term education and training. Working learners also must invest time, losing wages while likely taking on risky debt.

Social Finance offers to cover those opportunity costs, with zero-interest loans for the living expenses of healthcare workers who are looking to advance in their careers.

“Healthcare is becoming a predominant focus of our portfolio,” says Jake Edwards, VP of impact investing at the nonprofit Social Finance, which develops and manages outcomes-based workforce training and education pathways.

This take on education financing is about getting more results from public and private dollars. Borrowers who land good jobs and reach a specified wage threshold eventually pay back the principal on their loans, contributing to the pot of money for others like them. 

For example, the organization has partnered with New Jersey and the NJ CEO Council on the state’s $24M Pay It Forward program, which helps residents prepare for jobs in the healthcare, IT, and clean energy sectors. Social Finance also is helping to manage the $100M Google Career Certificates Fund, which invests in tech training and career support for 20K Americans.

The group is working on six new funds that have been launched in the last 18 months, all of which are designed for employees who need time and financing to earn a credential, says Edwards. “People like putting money into a low-income worker who wants to advance.”

The new funds feature a central role for employers: In Colorado, Social Finance recently tapped the state’s Pay It Forward Fund to back a partnership with Denver Health, a large nonprofit healthcare and hospital system. Qualifying students who enroll in eligible training programs run by Denver Health will be able to access zero-interest loans as a “financial bridge” to help them cover living expenses so they can focus on their education.

For borrowers who remain employed by Denver Health after graduation, the healthcare system will repay the majority of their zero-interest loan. A Denver Health official said in a statement that one goal of the partnership is to help boost employee retention. 

Training covered by the project with Social Finance includes six- to nine-month programs for dental assistants, paramedics, and phlebotomists. The initial pilot includes 80 students.

A similar small experiment in Massachusetts is focused on certified nursing assistants who want to pursue a licensed practical nurse certification. That program covers half of the paycheck for CNAs so they can work half-time and retain their benefits while attending college, Colleen Connolly reports for Work Shift.

“It’s going to look a little different in every context,” Edwards says. For example, allied health programs that fall under New Jersey’s fund—training for registered nurses and radiologic techs—feature non-refundable living stipends. And a $75M Social Finance healthcare training partnership in San Diego is focused on graduate-level behavioral health programs.

In Massachusetts, tuition at community colleges is free. So, as Connolly writes, time and lost wages are the biggest barrier for many students. Click over to Work Shift to read Connolly’s article on how a new career ladder program aims to cover those costs for entry-level healthcare workers.

“There’s definitely a heavy need,” Jessica Macdonald, executive director of the Quaboag Rehabilitation and Skilled Care Center in rural West Brookfield, Mass., told Connolly.

As Social Finance expands its work across healthcare and other industries, Edwards says the group has been able to draw from the infrastructure it developed for the Google fund. The Denver Health partnership, for example, features the same approach Social Finance is using with the tech training provider Per Scholas as part of the Google project.

The Kicker: “That’s the benefit of economies of scale,” says Edwards.

Stable Funding for Short-Term Credentials

An unusual new statewide ballot initiative in Colorado seeks to create a permanent funding stream dedicated to scholarships for short-term credentials in high-demand fields.

The proposal from Colorado Succeeds, a nonprofit business coalition, would not raise taxes. Instead it would transition Pinnacol Assurance, the state’s largest workers’ compensation insurance carrier, to a private, tax-paying company. New money generated through that move would be used to create an estimated $150M skilled workers and trades fund. A tax Pinnacol pays also would be routed to the program.

The money would be used to help pay for job-aligned training for 5K Coloradans per year, Colorado Succeeds says, with an estimated annual payout of $17.5M. Likely fields would include nursing, construction, skilled trades, firefighting, teaching, and other in-demand careers that pay living wages and are resistant to disruption by AI and automation.

The new endowment would feature business-led governance, evidence-based investments, and a pay-for-success approach tied to completion and employment.

“The funding approach is deliberate,” says Scott Laband, Colorado Succeeds’ president. It would create a “permanent, voter-approved funding source insulated from annual budget cycles and political shifts.” 

Most state-level moves to pay for short-term credentials have been created through legislative or executive action, not the ballot, says Stephanie Murphy, director of state policy and research at HCM Strategists, who has tracked state investments in short-term programs.

“That makes this a rare test of whether the broader public views these investments as a legitimate and worthwhile use of public dollars,” she says.

Likewise, the ballot push in Colorado could lead to funding sustainability that’s been elusive for short-term education and training. Many state investments in such credential programs have been short-lived, Murphy says, noting that HCM’s latest analysis found $1B in previous state funding across the U.S. on inactive programs—$184M in Colorado alone.

“When funding is episodic or temporary, it limits impact,” she says. That “makes it harder for institutions and employers to plan, and raises valid concerns about stewardship of public funds.”

Make or Break for Apprenticeship?

Apprenticeship in the U.S. may be entering a make-or-break moment, with many observers wondering whether supportive bipartisan rhetoric will lead to adequate funding and buy-in from employers.

The Trump administration last week announced that it will steer $145M in apprenticeship funding to a new pay-for-performance initiative, targeting industries like AI and semiconductor infrastructure, shipbuilding, IT, and healthcare. 

A few years ago, California created a performance-based fund for apprenticeship, a model that is common in Europe. Work Shift will be reporting on this approach, so let us know where we should be looking?

America Forward and Apprenticeships for America also last week published a policy brief on pay-for-success apprenticeships. The two nonprofits propose launching a series of pilot programs across states or regions to drive the transformation of apprenticeship funding. AFA also is helping coordinate apprenticeship sponsors, intermediaries, and state agencies that might like to partner on applications for the new federal pay-for-performance awards. (Interested organizations can take this survey.)

Also on the apprenticeship front, the Brookings Institution’s Annelies Goger describes takeaways from a delegation of employer-serving organizations and philanthropy leaders that visited Switzerland to learn about the business case for apprenticeships.

“The question for the U.S. isn’t whether to copy Switzerland’s model—it’s whether we’ll invest in the shared infrastructure that makes sustainable employer participation possible,” writes Goger, a fellow at Brookings Metro.

In a new brief, the Urban Institute’s Daniel Kuehn analyzed Virginia’s experience with registered apprenticeships. The state has seen steady growth, he finds, with roughly 18K active apprentices in 2024, up from 6K in 2017. Virginia’s share of new apprentices outside of the construction industry also has expanded modestly in recent years, as has the share of non-construction apprentices who are earning a living wage.

The incoming administration of Abigail Spanberger, Virginia’s Democratic governor-elect, has a strong foundation to build on, writes Kuehn, a principal research associate in Urban’s Work, Education, and Labor Division.

Open Tabs

Data Center Jobs
Microsoft this week committed to creating jobs for local residents as it develops data centers and the broader AI infrastructure. Brad Smith, the tech giant’s vice chair and president, wrote that new data centers typically create thousands of jobs during construction and hundreds during operations. Microsoft says it will invest in partnerships to help train local workers to support both phases of data centers, while also expanding its Datacenter Academy training program.

Federal Accountability
A federal negotiating committee last week reached consensus on a new accountability framework for higher education, which would apply an earnings test to all programs that are eligible for federal aid. Programs that fail to hit the proposed framework’s earnings threshold would lose access to federal loans. If at least half an institution’s aid-eligible students or federal aid revenue come from those programs, the institution also would lose Pell Grant eligibility.

State Policy
Economic and workforce development reclaimed its spot as the top policy priority cited by state higher education leaders, according to an annual survey from the State Higher Education Executive Officers Association. Higher education’s ROI was the third-highest-cited priority, rising one spot. State and system higher ed offices are increasing their outreach to labor and workforce agencies, SHEEO says, and collaborating more with businesses.

Incarceration to Careers
A project from Jobs for the Future seeks to help states expand education and workforce pathways for people with histories of incarceration. Kansas, Maine, North Carolina, and Oregon are the first states to join the effort. Each will receive up to $2.1M in funding and technical assistance valued at $1.8M from JFF and the Coleridge Initiative. State leaders will address barriers such as discriminatory hiring practices and legal restrictions, which often are exacerbated by misaligned systems.

Work-Based Learning
College Board has acquired the nonprofit District C and its work-based learning platform, Teamship, which offers internships where small teams of high school students solve real problems for businesses and organizations. Students receive coaching while they develop skills and get career exposure through alternative internships. The College Board lately has been ramping up its career focus, in part through tools available through its free BigFuture platform.

Job Moves
Pat Yongpradit has been hired as Microsoft’s general manager of global education and workforce policy. A former K–12 computer science and science teacher who still works as a part-time substitute teacher, Yongpradit since 2013 has been the chief academic officer at Code.org.

Monique Baptiste has been hired as Goodwill Industries International’s chief mission officer. Baptiste previously was chief program officer for STRIVE, a nonprofit skills training provider, after stints as JPMorgan Chase’s head of workforce philanthropy and corporate DEI talent lead.

Doug Shapiro has retired as executive director of the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center, where he worked since 2010. Shapiro previously directed institutional research at the New School and held a similar role at the Minnesota Private College Council.

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