College, Apprenticeship or Trade School, How to Compare Your Options

Somewhere along the way, American families were handed a map with one road on it. The road was labelled COLLEGE, the sign said SUCCESS, and anyone looking at the other turnoffs was assumed to be lost. The counselors pointed at it. The magazines ranked it. The relatives asked about it at Thanksgiving with the particular tone you use to ask whether someone has found a job yet.

Here is the plain truth, and it should not be controversial: there are at least three roads to a good life in this country, and which one is right depends on the person. Some young people are made for a lecture hall. Some are made for a job site. Some will need a year at a community college to find out which. A map with one road is not a map; it's a sales brochure. This post is the honest map, with a table you can put on the refrigerator.

The four paths

I am comparing four paths, which I will call by the names they usually go by.

1. A four-year degree. A bachelor's degree from a college or university.
2. A community college credential. A one-year or two-year certificate or an associate degree, which in some cases transfers into a bachelor's program.
3. A registered apprenticeship. A paid job in which you learn a trade from experienced workers, with classroom instruction alongside, in a program registered with the U.S. Department of Labor or a state apprenticeship agency. The system rests on the National Apprenticeship Act of 1937.
4. A trade or technical school. A private or public school offering short, focused training in a field such as welding, HVAC, cosmetology, medical assisting or commercial driving.

A word about the numbers in what follows. I'm describing patterns, not quoting statistics, because the figures change by field, by state and by year. Where I say "usually" or "often," I mean that exceptions are easy to find, and you should check your own case. I'll tell you at the end where to get current numbers.

The table

Read across, not just down. The columns that matter most for a family on a budget are the second and third rows: who pays and whether you earn while you learn. The apprenticeship is the only path in which the answer is that someone else pays and you are paid.

The apprenticeship model Germany made famous

If you want to see what an apprenticeship culture looks like at scale, look at Germany. Its dual system takes its name from the two places where a young person learns: at a company, where most of the time is spent doing the work, and in a public vocational school, which teaches theory and general subjects. The apprentice signs a training contract with an employer and is paid a training allowance. The system is governed by the Vocational Training Act of 1969, and the final examinations are run by the chambers of commerce and trades, which are made up of the employers in each field. Typical programs run about two to three and a half years.

What this does is bind the training to the job. The employer who trains you has a reason to train you well, because he plans to hire the person who finishes. The standards for each occupation are national, so a certificate means the same thing in Hamburg and Munich. And nobody graduates with a mountain of debt.

Two honest caveats. First, Germany's system sorts children into academic and vocational streams earlier than Americans would tolerate, and it is the kind of tracking that American critics have worried about for sixty years. Second, it depends on a dense network of employer associations and a tradition of shared standards that we do not have. You cannot airlift it. But the principle, that the person paying for the training is the person who will use it, travels well. American employers who build their own programs and register them are applying the same idea.

Who each path suits

Let me be concrete. These are portraits, hypothetical ones, not predictions.

The four-year degree suits the student whose chosen career requires one, such as most teaching, engineering, accounting and research roles, and the student who is ready for sustained academic work. It also suits the student who has a clear major, and a school with strong results in that major at a net price the family can carry. For this student, the degree can be a good bet. The arithmetic in A Worksheet for the True Cost of a College Degree Before You Sign Anything shows how to test it.

The community college credential suits the student who is not sure. Two years at a community college costs far less on the published price than two years at most four-year schools, and it keeps options open: a student can stop with a credential, or transfer. It suits the working adult who needs a credential fast, and the family that needs the student at home. The catch is the transfer. Get the agreement in writing before the first class, because credits that evaporate are the most expensive thing in education.

The registered apprenticeship suits the person who learns by doing, who would rather be paid than charged, and who is willing to start at a modest wage and climb. It is not easy. Slots can be competitive, the work can be hard on the body, and the early wage is lower than the later one. But there is no tuition bill and no gap in the resume. Most people think of the construction trades, and those are the best known, but programs now exist in fields from health care to information technology to manufacturing.

The trade or technical school suits the person who wants a particular skill quickly and knows the local market wants it. It can be an excellent route to a welding certificate or a commercial driver's license. It can also be a trap. Some programs charge a great deal for training that employers do not value. Before you sign, ask the questions in the next section.

One kitchen table, three teenagers

Picture a hypothetical family with three teenagers, and notice that the right road is different for each.

The oldest loves chemistry and has a plan: pharmacy, which requires a degree and a license. For her, the four-year road is not a choice but a requirement, and the question is only how to pay for it with the least debt. That means comparing net price at two or three schools, and asking whether a year or two at the community college down the street could cover the introductory courses at a fraction of the price.

The middle one has no idea what he wants, gets restless in a classroom, and has spent three summers helping a cousin who does electrical work. For him, the question is whether a local electrical contractor or a union hall sponsors an apprenticeship, what the wage is in the first year, and how many hours the state requires for a license. The cost of finding out is a few phone calls. The cost of guessing wrong, four years and a pile of debt for a degree he does not want, is far larger.

The youngest wants to work with her hands but also wants to run something someday. For her, a community college certificate in a technical field might be a first step, followed by work, followed by evening classes in business, paid for in part by an employer. Nothing about that is second best. It is the sequence of a person who builds a ladder one rung at a time, and keeps a paycheck while she does.

Three children, three roads, one family. The mistake is to hold the same plan for all of them because it worked for a cousin. Another mistake is to decide for them. The job of a parent is to put the real numbers on the table, ask the six questions below, and let the child own the choice.

Six questions to ask any program

These work whether you are looking at a university, a community college, an apprenticeship or a trade school.

1. What share of students finish? A program with a high dropout rate is selling you something other than an education.
2. What do graduates earn, and how do you know? Ask for the source, and compare it with an independent number.
3. What does it cost after grants, and what would I borrow? Use the net price, and run the loan formula.
4. Is it accredited, and by whom? For federal aid, it must be. The gatekeeping behind that answer is explained in Accreditation, the Gatekeeper Nobody Elected That Decides Who Gets Federal Money.
5. Does it lead to the license I need? Check with your state licensing board, not only the school.
6. What happens to my credits or hours if I move or stop? Portable credit is worth real money.

The licensing wrinkle

Many of the best-paying trades require a state license, and licensing rules vary widely from state to state. In some states a license is a reasonable safety check. In others it's a toll booth. The extreme version, a government permission slip required to braid hair, is covered in the license you need to braid hair and the jobs it quietly kills. Before you commit to a trade, read your state's licensing requirements: the hours, the exams and the fees. A career that needs 8,000 hours of supervised work before you can do the job on your own is a different proposition from one that needs a weekend course and a fee.

Mixing and matching

The table makes the paths look like separate lanes, and they aren't. A student can start in an apprenticeship and earn college credit through a community college. An electrician can run a business and take a bachelor's in the evenings. A graduate with a degree and no job can go through a trade program and come out with both. Employers often pay tuition for workers who earn it back. The best choice for a young person at eighteen is often not the best choice at twenty-five, and the system should make it easy to change.

That flexibility is also part of why the history matters. The long decline of high school shop and vocational classes is told in What America's Shop Class Lost, From Smith-Hughes to the Perkins Act. The country once had a broader doorway into skilled work, and it can have one again.

Where to check current numbers

I have kept numbers out of the table on purpose, because they go stale and they differ by place. Here is where to find current ones.

• The Bureau of Labor Statistics Occupational Outlook Handbook. For hundreds of occupations it lists typical pay, the typical entry education, whether on-the-job training is expected, and the projected demand. Its occupational wage statistics give pay by metro area. How those numbers are produced is explained in how the jobs numbers work, answered in eleven questions.
• The Education Department's College Scorecard. It reports graduation rates, typical debt and earnings of former students for many schools and programs.
• The Department of Labor's apprenticeship resources. They list registered programs and the occupations they cover, and your state apprenticeship agency can point you to local sponsors.
• Your state licensing board. For the exact hours and exams a trade requires.
• A local employer. Call three of them and ask what they would hire, what they pay and what training they respect. It costs a phone call.

The bottom line

• The honest answer is three roads, not one. A four-year degree, a community college credential, a registered apprenticeship and a trade school each suit different people.
• The apprenticeship is the only path in which you are paid while you learn and someone else covers the training. Germany's dual system is the model, with caveats about early tracking.
• Ask every program the same questions: completion, earnings, net cost, accreditation, licensing and portability.
• Look up current pay and demand in the Bureau of Labor Statistics Occupational Outlook Handbook and the College Scorecard before you decide.
• Stop treating a trade as the consolation prize. A family that respects all three roads gives its children a better chance of choosing the right one.