LAKELAND - Throughout the 2024-2025 school year, high school students in the Northern Lights Public Schools division (NLPS) will have the opportunity to study trades and work as apprentices by participating in the Registered Apprenticeship Program (RAP).
Nicole Garner, a spokesperson with NLPS, says apprenticeship programs are very beneficial for students who want to pursue careers in the trades after graduating from high school. These programs, she added, allow students to work and earn their apprenticeship hours while attending high school.
“For some students, being able to participate in RAP is a great motivator to continue to attend and graduate from high school,” Garner told Lakeland This Week. “The opportunity to also be paid and have a job while attending high school and have that be part of your classes is also a benefit for many students.”
To participate in the RAP, students have to be 15 or older, meaning that the program is only for high school students.
However, as Garner explains, officials with the school division are continually exploring new ways to expose students to the trades at the middle school level.
Some ways NLPS gets middle school students interested in the trades is through its mobile trades lab and career fairs. The mobile trades lab, Garner said, gets parked in at least three different middle schools each year and offers students the opportunity to try welding and learn about trades.
To start the school year, she explained, the lab is at Ardmore, it will move to Bourgoin Middle School in Bonnyville before Christmas, and then finish the year in Glendon.
“Some of our schools also bring in speakers who work in the trades to share their experiences with students.
This past summer, NLPS partnered with Portage College to create a dual-credit course called ‘Introduction to the Trades,’ which was offered during summer school.
According to information from NLPS, the four trades offered in the program include carpentry, steamfitting and pipefitting, welding, and power engineering. This hands-on learning was held inside the Portage College trades lab.
Garner went on to say that the public school division has been working with Portage College for quite some time on developing dual credit courses for students.
Dual credit courses are courses that provide students with the opportunity to earn high school credits aligned with post-secondary credits or other career-related credentials.
“With interest in trades careers growing, we wanted to explore ways we could offer dual credit opportunities related to the trades,” she said. “We know the best way for students to explore a trade or career is to get some hands-on experience and have the opportunity to try it out themselves, so utilizing the lab at Portage in Lac La Biche was a great fit.”
As for the number of students within the school division who are enroled in trades programs, Garner says they fluctuate from year to year and are dependent on two factors: students who are interested in participating in these programs, as well as employers who are willing to take on apprentices.
The economy is also a considerable factor.
Garner said when the economy is doing well and employers are looking for apprentices, enrolment in RAP tends to be higher. However, during economic slowdowns, numbers decline.
“At times when the economy is not doing well, it has been more challenging to find placements for students and interest has also been lower as students have not necessarily seen trades as a viable career path,” she said.
