How to start a registered electrical apprenticeship program

To start a registered electrical apprenticeship program, you either write your own standards and register them with the US Department of Labor (or your State Apprenticeship Agency), or you sign on with a group sponsor that already has registered standards. Federal rules call for at least 2,000 hours of on-the-job learning, about 144 classroom hours a year, a rising wage schedule and a written ratio (29 CFR 29.5). Most small shops take the group route.

01Why register instead of just training helpers

Registration puts the training on paper. The hours count toward a license, you can pay apprentice rates on public work, and school is built in. Without it, you're training helpers with nothing to show for it.

Four things change when an apprentice is registered:

• Hours count toward his card. Some states only count hours logged while the apprentice was registered or licensed. Idaho counts apprentice time only while he was registered with the state (Idaho Code 54-1007), and Iowa doesn't credit time as an unlicensed unclassified person toward a registered program (Iowa Code 103.15). A helper with no registration may be building nothing toward a journeyman exam.
• Apprentice rates on prevailing wage jobs. On Davis-Bacon work, only apprentices individually registered in a program registered with DOL (or a recognized state agency) can be paid less than the journeyman rate on the wage determination (29 CFR 5.5(a)(4)). More on that in Davis-Bacon for electrical contractors.
• School he can't skip. The classroom piece is built into the program.
• Veterans can draw GI Bill money on top of wages. Apprenticeship.gov says registered programs can be approved for GI Bill benefits through a State Approving Agency (Apprenticeship.gov, Employers).

If you're still deciding whether an apprentice or a journeyman should be your next hire, start with who to hire next as your shop grows.

02What the federal rules require

A registered program has five parts and a short list of hard numbers. Apprenticeship.gov lists the five parts as industry-led, a paid job with wages that rise as skills grow, structured on-the-job learning with a mentor, supplemental education (the classroom piece), and a credential at the end (Apprenticeship.gov, Registered Apprenticeship Program).

The numbers come from the federal standards in 29 CFR 29.5:

Two things to notice. The 2,000 hours is the federal minimum for a program, not the length of an electrical apprenticeship. Electrician apprenticeships usually run 4 or 5 years at about 2,000 paid hours a year, per the BLS Occupational Outlook Handbook. And 144 hours a year is a recommendation. Your state license rules may set their own classroom minimum, so check them first.

The standards also have to cover a work process schedule (what the apprentice learns on the job and roughly how many hours on each), how you rate progress, a written apprenticeship agreement, equal employment rules under 29 CFR part 30, and records. A group sponsor has already written all of this.

03Two ways to set it up

You can sponsor your own program or join someone else's. For a shop under 20 hands, joining is usually faster and cheaper.

Open-shop group sponsors

For open shops, the two big group sponsors are IEC and ABC chapters. IEC says its electrical apprenticeship runs about four years, with at least 8,000 on-the-job hours and 576 classroom hours, at more than 70 training locations, and that it's recognized by DOL (IEC apprenticeship). Apprentices work for an IEC contractor during the day and go to class at night. ABC chapters offer more than 450 government-registered apprenticeship programs across the trades, searchable by trade on ABC's apprenticeship locator.

Union programs

Union shops train through the local JATC, the joint apprenticeship and training committee the IBEW local and the NECA chapter run together. JATCs teach from electrical training ALLIANCE materials. If you're signatory, your apprentices come through the JATC and you follow the local's ratio and wage sheet.

04Steps from "Express Interest" to your first apprentice

Here's the order most shops follow. It takes weeks to a few months, depending on your state and whether you join a group program.

1. Check your state license rules first. Find out how your state registers apprentices, what classroom hours it requires and what supervision ratio applies. Arkansas, for example, makes the contractor register a new apprentice within 30 days and requires school to start no later than the first full semester after hire (17 CAR 210-507). Ratios vary a lot; see apprentice to journeyman ratio rules by state.
2. Click "Express Interest" on Apprenticeship.gov. You answer a few questions and DOL connects you with an apprenticeship consultant. Apprenticeship.gov lists no-cost technical help as a benefit of registering (Apprenticeship.gov).
3. Decide: group sponsor or your own. Call your nearest IEC or ABC chapter (open shop) or the JATC (signatory shops) and ask what it costs to sign on, when classes start and how they handle mid-year hires.
4. Set your wage schedule. Write a step for each period as a percent of your journeyman rate. Group sponsors usually hand you one. See how much to pay an apprentice electrician for real union percentages to compare.
5. Pick your mentors. Each apprentice needs a journeyman who'll actually teach. Your best producer isn't always your best teacher.
6. Register the program or sign the participation agreement. Registration goes to DOL's Office of Apprenticeship or your State Apprenticeship Agency, whichever covers your state.
7. Sign an apprenticeship agreement with each apprentice and register him. Do the state license registration at the same time.
8. Track hours from day one. Weekly, by work process. When the apprentice applies for his journeyman exam, these records are what the board looks at.

05What it costs and how one shop gets the money back

Your biggest costs are tuition, books, your journeyman's time and the apprentice's wage while he's still slow. The biggest risk is training someone who leaves the year he gets good.

One IEC member contractor, writing about their own program, laid out a simple way to handle both (IEC workforce spotlight):

• The shop pays 100% of books and tuition if the apprentice keeps a B or better.
• The apprentice puts up $1,000 to start school. The shop gives it back if he's still with them at graduation.
• They aim for at least five new first-years every year and had more than 30 in school at once.
• They pay referral bonuses starting at $300 when an employee brings in a green helper, paid once the new hire passes six months.

The $1,000 deposit is the clever part. It costs a committed apprentice nothing in the end, and it makes the one who's shopping around think twice. If you copy it, put it in writing and run it past your employment lawyer, since rules on wage deductions and repayment agreements vary by state.

Here's a worked example of what the first year looks like. Say your journeyman rate is $40 an hour and your first-period apprentice starts at 45% of it, $18 an hour. Over 2,000 hours that's $36,000 in straight-time wages before payroll taxes and insurance. If tuition and books run $2,500 for the year (check your sponsor's number; this one is an example), year one costs about $38,500 plus burden.

Compare that to renting. One national electrical contractor told us an agency sent them three apprentices billed at about $87.50 an hour, plus per diem. That bill rate is $69.50 an hour over the $18 example wage, before your burden. Over one 40-hour week that's $2,780 per apprentice, more than the example's whole year of tuition.

06How to keep them after you train them

Registration helps you keep apprentices because the program, the school and the wage steps are tied to your shop. The rest is on you.

• Pay every step on time. A raise due at 1,000 hours is paid at 1,000 hours, not at the next review.
• Keep him on real work. An apprentice stuck sweeping for 18 months leaves for the shop that lets him pipe.
• Rotate his journeyman once a year so he sees service, commercial and gear.
• Show him the next card with real numbers: what a journeyman and a foreman make with you.

More on keeping hands once they're good in how to keep good electricians from leaving.

If you need licensed journeymen now to run work and mentor the apprentices you're bringing on, apply here and we'll see if we can put 5 licensed electricians in front of you in 14 days.

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