Palm Beach County School Board member wants more training in the trades for students
Palm Beach County School Board member Matthew Jay Lane wants the school district to expand its career and technical education program so more graduating seniors who are not college-bound can step into a career in the trades.
"My goal is to create an internal pipeline for our local skilled workers for the businesses in our community and to create a pipeline for our students who might not otherwise have jobs to change the trajectory of their lives," Lane said during the June 4 school board meeting.
The district already has a wide set of offerings for students who want to find after-high school work in everything from agriculture and construction to sales and transportation. Students can leave high school with industry certifications for a long list of job types, including emergency medical technician, automobile technician, medical assistant and pharmacy technician.
But Lane said he wants the district to do more.
"From my research, one of the biggest complaints that I found was that when students across the country graduate, they've only taken one or two courses in the trades," he said. "So they don't possess the skills they need to immediately go to work."
For generations, schools offered vocational or "shop" classes to students who did not plan to go to college after graduation. Over time, with jobs requiring a college degree typically paying more than those that don't, some schools emphasized college preparedness and de-emphasized vocational classes.
Bachelor's degree holders still earn significantly more than non-college graduates. The median annual salary for those with a bachelor's degree was $80,236, according to 2024 figures from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. For those whose highest educational attainment was a high school diploma, the median annual salary was $48,360.
Not all college degrees are worth the same in the job market, though. The average salary for a college graduate with a humanities degree is $54,258, according to ZipRecruiter. That's less than the $62,400 average annual salary of an electrician or plumber, and it's less than the $58,240 average annual salary of an HVAC technician.
There might not be a hungry market for English or philosophy majors, but people who can drive a forklift, hang drywall or wire a building are in extremely high demand. Some of that is tied to the economic cycle, and some of it is because older tradesmen are "aging out" of the workforce and aren't being replaced quickly enough by younger workers.
"For every five people who retire, only one is trained to replace them," Eligio Marquez Veray, district associate dean for Trade and Industry at Palm Beach State College, was quoted as saying in a news article on the school's website.
Lane said he's been told of that problem, too.
"I've spoken to many, many business leaders in our community about this issue," he said. "One business owner told me a story. He needed 150 employees to finish a project, but he only could recruit 85. He had a deadline to finish the project, and he didn't have enough skilled workers to do so. This is a standard problem in the industry."
Palm Beach State College is already working to connect young people to jobs in the trades. It got a $1.75 million grant last year to boost those efforts, and Klein Tools and Lowe's have provided financial support to the school's Construction Trades Center for Workforce Innovation.
Precisely how the the school district will change its career and technical program is unclear. The district plans to hold a series of workshops on it this fall.
Lane's colleagues welcomed his push for an expanded career and technical program.
"You're preaching to the choir here," board member Karen Brill said.
"This topic is a big deal," added board member Marcia Andrews.
Lane said preparing more students to enter the workforce after high school is an imperative, given the district's college matriculation rates.
A district report from May 2024 found that 58% of students who graduated in 2023 were enrolled in a college or university that fall. That percentage has been stuck in the upper 50s since 2019, when it was 64%.
The report also found significant racial and ethnic gaps in the going-to-college rates of district students.
Only 49% of Hispanic graduates in 2023 were enrolled at a college or university that fall. For Black graduates, it was 54%, and for white graduates it was 70%.
Lane said he wants to make sure students who don't go to college are prepared to feed a hungry labor market. Employers want that, too, he said.
"We have excellent career and technical education programs in our district, and the business community would like us to focus on enhancing those career and technical education programs," he said.
Want more education news? Sign up for ourExtra Credit weekly newsletter, delivered every Friday!
Wayne Washington is a journalist covering education for The Palm Beach Post. You can reach him at wwashington@pbpost.com. Help support our work; subscribe today.
This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Post: Palm Beach County School District looking to expand training in trades
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
CNN
3 hours ago
- CNN
So, has anything actually gotten more expensive because of Trump's tariffs?
Source: CNN Predictions from mainstream economists were dire after President Donald Trump launched his tariff campaign just a couple weeks after he began his second term in office: Prices would rise — sharply — they said, reigniting an inflation crisis that tens of millions of Americans had elected him to solve. But that massive, tariff-induced inflation spike hasn't materialized. Not even close. Not yet, anyway. Consumer prices rose just 2.4%, annually, last month, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. That was less than economists had expected, and only slightly higher than the 2.3% rate in April, which was the US economy's lowest inflation since February 2021. According to the Personal Consumption Expenditures price index most closely followed by the Federal Reserve, core inflation — which strips out volatile items like food and gas prices — fell to 2.5% in April. That was the lowest reading since March 2021. That's a far cry from what economists and consumers have predicted. Month after month, inflation has fallen short of Wall Street's expectations, as American businesses said they would be forced to hike prices as a result of historically high tariffs. America's effective tariff rate is now 14.1%, according to Fitch Ratings, up from 2.3% last year. That means Trump raised taxes on imported goods by nearly 12 percentage points in 2025. Economists expected substantial inflation increases as a result. Goldman Sachs analysts last month said core goods inflation could hit 6.3% this year and consumer prices would surge 3.7% by early 2026. JPMorgan economists said core inflation would nearly double by the end of this year. And American consumers in May expected prices to rise an alarming 6.6% this year, according to sentiment surveys from the University of Michigan. That prediction fell in June, but consumers still expect inflation to hit 5.1% in 2025. So what happened? Are economists just really bad at their jobs? Not quite. Their predictions may yet come true — and economists are largely cleaving to their bets. America's economy is enormous and complex, and predicting when prices will rise and fall can be an extremely tricky business — particularly when factoring in the on-again, off-again nature of Trump's tariff regime. Still, tariffs through mid-June haven't caused inflation to spike. Love tariffs or hate them, there's no denying inflation is lower now than when Trump took office. Fed Chair Jerome Powell on Wednesday said just a few items are growing in price as a result of tariffs, including electronics that come from China. He said PCs and A/V equipment have become more expensive because of Trump's trade war. But the price increases aren't widespread yet, Powell noted, because stores are still working through the inventory that came in to their warehouses before Trump put tariffs in place. 'Goods being sold at retailers today may have been imported several months ago, before tariffs were imposed,' Powell said. Research firm Telsey Advisory Group, which has been tracking the prices of 80 select consumer items across a wide variety of retail categories, reported this week that just 19 products it has tracked have gained in price since mid-April — and 16 items' prices fell. Similarly, the New York Times' Wirecutter, which recommends consumer products, tracked the prices for 40 of its top picks over the course of two months and found this week that the vast majority didn't change price at all: 10 gained in price and only half of those gained more than 7%. 'There haven't been many significant upticks in prices as of yet given that many retailers are still selling through their lower-cost inventory,' Dana Telsey, CEO and chief research officer of Telsey Advisory Group told CNN. Even autos, many of which are subject to a 25% tariff, plus a tariff of up to 25% on some imported auto parts, haven't gained in price — they've fallen . New car prices fell 0.2% in May, according to car-buying research site Edmunds, and they rose only 2.5% compared to the pre-tariff period in March. Both new and used car prices fell in May, according to the BLS' Consumer Price Index. That's because dealers are still working through their supply of pre-tariff cars, according to Ivan Drury, director of insights at Edmunds. With prices remaining in check so far, the Trump administration has declared victory. 'They've all been discredited,' said the White House's top trade adviser, Peter Navarro, in an interview last month with CNN, referring to tariffs' detractors. 'What we got in the first term [of Trump's presidency] was not recession or inflation, we got price stability, robust economic growth and rising wages, just as we thought we would.' Navarro has frequently pointed to the low overall inflation during Trump's first term, despite his tariffs. And he's right: CPI peaked at 2.9% in mid-2018 before falling below 2% throughout most of 2019. But Navarro's assertion about the impact of tariffs on the US economy comes with a couple of significant caveats: First, Trump during his current term has already placed tariffs of at least 10% on $2.3 trillion of imported goods, comprising 71% of all US goods imports, according to the nonpartisan Tax Foundation. In his first term, Trump placed tariffs on just $380 billion worth of foreign goods. And second, the pandemic severely disrupted the global economy soon after Trump's tariffs took effect, preventing economists from getting a decent picture of how significantly prices rose. But some data shows prices gained in the specific sectors Trump targeted with his first-term tariffs. For example, after imposing some steel tariffs in 2018, US production expanded modestly, but it sent costs rising for cars, tools and machines; and shrank those industries' output by more than $3 billion in 2021, the International Trade Commission found in a 2023 analysis. Nevertheless, Joseph Lavorgna, a former Wall Street economist turned Treasury Department official, took a victory lap because inflation hasn't risen since Trump imposed tariffs during his second term. 'Tariffs have just not shown up at all in any of the data,' Lavorgna, counselor to the Treasury secretary, told CNN this week. 'The forecasting community has been completely wrong.' Lavorgna, a former SMBC Nikko Securities chief economist who also served in the White House during Trump's first term, said a broad range of inflation metrics suggests foreign producers are absorbing tariffs and that the trade war won't be inflationary. White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt echoed that message Thursday during a briefing, saying: 'America is quickly returning to the successful formula of the first Trump administration: low inflation and rising wages.' Many mainstream economists argue that the low inflation of the spring represents a calm before the summer storm, when they expect prices to rise. 'It's a question of when, not if,' Stephanie Roth, chief economist at Wolfe Research, told CNN. Walmart, Target, Lululemon, Home Depot and Costco among others have said in recent weeks that they will raise some prices because of tariff pressures. Although some of the big box retailers said they would work to keep most prices low, they acknowledged that they operate low-margin businesses, and in the cases when American-made alternatives are unavailable or more expensive, they expect that they'll have to pass some of that additional cost to their customers. Consumers won't be alone in their struggles with tariffs in the coming months, said said Sid Malladi, CEO of Nuvo, a company that manages businesses' trade partnerships. Price hikes will weigh on businesses, too, many of whom will take on some of the hit to keep prices as low as possible for as long as possible. But that could mean difficult conversations in the boardroom later this year about potential layoffs and other cost cutting. 'This is early innings. No one wants to be first out of the gate,' said Malladi. 'You don't want to risk reputational damage to your brand, because raising prices in this environment might cause customers to turn away from you. Many may eat their margin for a few months.' 'It's hard to overstate the level of anxiety businesses have,' Malladi added. Small businesses, without the supply chain mastery of larger companies, have struggled in particular to afford higher tariff costs and have said they are reducing supply or raising prices. Many have complained that American alternatives for some foreign imports may be unavailable or are too expensive. 'While larger retailers may have the scale, capital and pricing power to absorb or strategically offset these pressures, small and mid-sized players remain significantly more vulnerable, with limited flexibility to manage rising input costs or supply disruptions,' Telsey said in TAG's latest Product Pricing Analysis report. Telsey noted that prices, when they eventually start to rise, won't all gain equally or across the board. Only select goods will start to gain in price to start, likely beginning in late August or September. 'Inventory is ordered typically anywhere from six months to one year in advance, and it is expected that the select pricing pieces will begin to show up in late summer,' she said. Fed Chair Powell on Wednesday agreed that the tipping point for broad consumer price increases could come this summer as inventories of pre-tariff warehoused goods dry up. 'We do expect to see more of that over the course of the summer,' Powell said. 'It takes some time for tariffs to work their way through the chain of distribution to the end consumer.' Normally, retailers hold about 1 to 2 months' worth of inventory on items, noted Kristy Akullian, head of iShares Investment Strategy, Americas, so prices could begin to rise in the coming weeks. Another indication that prices could start to spike: In April's Institute for Supply Management services report, prices paid by businesses increased the most since November 2022, and business inventories contracted. 'Low inventories make it harder for companies to keep prices steady, so going forward, we expect the inflation impacts from tariffs to become more apparent,' Akullian said. Powell agreed with that timeline, noting companies that report on their business sentiment to the Fed have said they expect to pass those tariff costs on down the supply chain. 'Many, many companies do expect to put all or — some of the effect of tariffs through to the next person in the chain, and ultimately, to the consumer,' Powell said. 'So we're beginning to see some effects. We expect to see more.' Despite initial success at maintaining low prices, Treasury's Lavorgna conceded inflation could begin to rise down the road because of tariffs. 'I'm not saying there can't be a tariff effect on the numbers at some point,' he said. See Full Web Article
Business Insider
5 hours ago
- Business Insider
I couldn't build a future on my Nigerian teaching salary, now I earn triple in the U.S.
This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with a successful teen coach and counselor based in Atlanta, U.S. Business Insider Africa has verified his professional background. The author shares his journey from teaching in Nigeria to becoming a successful teen coach and counselor in the U.S. He highlights the improved financial opportunities and infrastructure available in the U.S. that motivated his decision to stay. He emphasizes the importance of strategic planning for those considering emigration, particularly in fields like healthcare, tech, and education. When I first considered leaving Nigeria for the United States, I knew it wouldn't be a straightforward journey, especially with a degree from a Nigerian university. The shift into counseling stemmed from a passion for supporting immigrant and Black youth. Teaching in the US offered better financial opportunities and professional growth compared to Nigeria. While returning to Africa is considered, systemic challenges with credential recognition and mental health infrastructure remain. I studied Education and English at the University of Uyo, and while I was proud of my training and my years of teaching in Akwa Ibom, I also knew that the global job market wouldn't automatically see my degree the way I did. The first hurdle was evaluation. I had to get my transcript assessed by a credential evaluation agency here in the U.S., and even though it was eventually recognized as equivalent to a U.S. bachelor's degree, the process was both expensive and frustrating. Between gathering documents from my alma mater (with the usual delays), paying the evaluation fees, and navigating visa requirements, I can say that the emotional stress was as real as the financial cost. Coming to the U.S., what helped me was the discipline and patience I'd built over the years back in Nigeria. Classroom management is a universal language, and whether you're in Ikot Ekpene or Atlanta, children need structure, attention, and a sense of safety. Financial breakthrough Financially, the difference was almost like night and day. As a teacher in Nigeria, even with over a decade of experience, my salary could barely sustain a modest lifestyle. In the U.S., once I got certified, the starting salary was almost triple what I earned back home. Of course, the cost of living is higher, and bills pile up quickly here, but even with that, the opportunity to save, invest, and build credit made the move worthwhile. The salary was definitely a major factor in my decision to stay—it gave me the breathing room to support my family back home and plan long-term for my own children's future. Transitioning from teaching to counseling Transitioning into counseling came naturally. As a teacher, I always gravitated toward the emotional and psychological well-being of my students. I saw the need, especially among immigrant children and Black youth. I went back to school and acquired more training in counselling, which gave me greater leverage in advancing my career. Would I consider returning to Africa to work in a similar capacity? Yes, and no. Yes, because the need is great, especially in terms of mental health awareness and support systems for young people. But I know the reality—most African systems don't yet recognize U.S. counseling credentials without jumping through hoops. I'd likely need to do a local conversion program or pass certain licensure exams. Also, infrastructure and funding for such roles back home are still catching up. So, while I may consult or volunteer from time to time, I haven't fully committed to returning just yet. What intending migrants should know When it comes to African emigration, I have mixed feelings. On one hand, I believe it's a viable and often necessary route for personal and professional growth—especially when systems at home don't provide fair reward for talent or effort. But I also worry about brain drain and the slow decay of essential services in our countries when the best minds leave. My advice to those considering emigration is simple: come with a plan. Don't come on vibes. Evaluate your credentials, research your field, and have both short-term survival goals and long-term career goals. It's not easy, and it's not always rosy, but it can be worth it if you approach it with intention and discipline. In terms of qualifications that travel well, healthcare remains number one—nurses, doctors, physical therapists, and lab scientists are always in demand. Tech, of course, is booming—whether it's data science, cybersecurity, or software development. Education is also valuable, especially special education and STEM teaching roles. Looking back, I'd say it was definitely easier to move when I did. The immigration climate has become more restrictive, and visa approval is more uncertain now.
Yahoo
11 hours ago
- Yahoo
So, has anything actually gotten more expensive because of Trump's tariffs?
Predictions from mainstream economists were dire after President Donald Trump launched his tariff campaign just a couple weeks after he began his second term in office: Prices would rise — sharply — they said, reigniting an inflation crisis that tens of millions of Americans had elected him to solve. But that massive, tariff-induced inflation spike hasn't materialized. Not even close. Not yet, anyway. Consumer prices rose just 2.4%, annually, last month, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. That was less than economists had expected, and only slightly higher than the 2.3% rate in April, which was the US economy's lowest inflation since February 2021. According to the Personal Consumption Expenditures price index most closely followed by the Federal Reserve, core inflation — which strips out volatile items like food and gas prices — fell to 2.5% in April. That was the lowest reading since March 2021. That's a far cry from what economists and consumers have predicted. Month after month, inflation has fallen short of Wall Street's expectations, as American businesses said they would be forced to hike prices as a result of historically high tariffs. America's effective tariff rate is now 14.1%, according to Fitch Ratings, up from 2.3% last year. That means Trump raised taxes on imported goods by nearly 12 percentage points in 2025. Economists expected substantial inflation increases as a result. Goldman Sachs analysts last month said core goods inflation could hit 6.3% this year and consumer prices would surge 3.7% by early 2026. JPMorgan economists said core inflation would nearly double by the end of this year. And American consumers in May expected prices to rise an alarming 6.6% this year, according to sentiment surveys from the University of Michigan. That prediction fell in June, but consumers still expect inflation to hit 5.1% in 2025. So what happened? Are economists just really bad at their jobs? Not quite. Their predictions may yet come true — and economists are largely cleaving to their bets. America's economy is enormous and complex, and predicting when prices will rise and fall can be an extremely tricky business — particularly when factoring in the on-again, off-again nature of Trump's tariff regime. Still, tariffs through mid-June haven't caused inflation to spike. Love tariffs or hate them, there's no denying inflation is lower now than when Trump took office. Fed Chair Jerome Powell on Wednesday said just a few items are growing in price as a result of tariffs, including electronics that come from China. He said PCs and A/V equipment have become more expensive because of Trump's trade war. But the price increases aren't widespread yet, Powell noted, because stores are still working through the inventory that came in to their warehouses before Trump put tariffs in place. 'Goods being sold at retailers today may have been imported several months ago, before tariffs were imposed,' Powell said. Research firm Telsey Advisory Group, which has been tracking the prices of 80 select consumer items across a wide variety of retail categories, reported this week that just 19 products it has tracked have gained in price since mid-April — and 16 items' prices fell. Similarly, the New York Times' Wirecutter, which recommends consumer products, tracked the prices for 40 of its top picks over the course of two months and found this week that the vast majority didn't change price at all: 10 gained in price and only half of those gained more than 7%. 'There haven't been many significant upticks in prices as of yet given that many retailers are still selling through their lower-cost inventory,' Dana Telsey, CEO and chief research officer of Telsey Advisory Group told CNN. Even autos, many of which are subject to a 25% tariff, plus a tariff of up to 25% on some imported auto parts, haven't gained in price — they've fallen. New car prices fell 0.2% in May, according to car-buying research site Edmunds, and they rose only 2.5% compared to the pre-tariff period in March. Both new and used car prices fell in May, according to the BLS' Consumer Price Index. That's because dealers are still working through their supply of pre-tariff cars, according to Ivan Drury, director of insights at Edmunds. With prices remaining in check so far, the Trump administration has declared victory. 'They've all been discredited,' said the White House's top trade adviser, Peter Navarro, in an interview last month with CNN, referring to tariffs' detractors. 'What we got in the first term [of Trump's presidency] was not recession or inflation, we got price stability, robust economic growth and rising wages, just as we thought we would.' Navarro has frequently pointed to the low overall inflation during Trump's first term, despite his tariffs. And he's right: CPI peaked at 2.9% in mid-2018 before falling below 2% throughout most of 2019. But Navarro's assertion about the impact of tariffs on the US economy comes with a couple of significant caveats: First, Trump during his current term has already placed tariffs of at least 10% on $2.3 trillion of imported goods, comprising 71% of all US goods imports, according to the nonpartisan Tax Foundation. In his first term, Trump placed tariffs on just $380 billion worth of foreign goods. And second, the pandemic severely disrupted the global economy soon after Trump's tariffs took effect, preventing economists from getting a decent picture of how significantly prices rose. But some data shows prices gained in the specific sectors Trump targeted with his first-term tariffs. For example, after imposing some steel tariffs in 2018, US production expanded modestly, but it sent costs rising for cars, tools and machines; and shrank those industries' output by more than $3 billion in 2021, the International Trade Commission found in a 2023 analysis. Nevertheless, Joseph Lavorgna, a former Wall Street economist turned Treasury Department official, took a victory lap because inflation hasn't risen since Trump imposed tariffs during his second term. 'Tariffs have just not shown up at all in any of the data,' Lavorgna, counselor to the Treasury secretary, told CNN this week. 'The forecasting community has been completely wrong.' Lavorgna, a former SMBC Nikko Securities chief economist who also served in the White House during Trump's first term, said a broad range of inflation metrics suggests foreign producers are absorbing tariffs and that the trade war won't be inflationary. White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt echoed that message Thursday during a briefing, saying: 'America is quickly returning to the successful formula of the first Trump administration: low inflation and rising wages.' Many mainstream economists argue that the low inflation of the spring represents a calm before the summer storm, when they expect prices to rise. 'It's a question of when, not if,' Stephanie Roth, chief economist at Wolfe Research, told CNN. Walmart, Target, Lululemon, Home Depot and Costco among others have said in recent weeks that they will raise some prices because of tariff pressures. Although some of the big box retailers said they would work to keep most prices low, they acknowledged that they operate low-margin businesses, and in the cases when American-made alternatives are unavailable or more expensive, they expect that they'll have to pass some of that additional cost to their customers. Consumers won't be alone in their struggles with tariffs in the coming months, said said Sid Malladi, CEO of Nuvo, a company that manages businesses' trade partnerships. Price hikes will weigh on businesses, too, many of whom will take on some of the hit to keep prices as low as possible for as long as possible. But that could mean difficult conversations in the boardroom later this year about potential layoffs and other cost cutting. 'This is early innings. No one wants to be first out of the gate,' said Malladi. 'You don't want to risk reputational damage to your brand, because raising prices in this environment might cause customers to turn away from you. Many may eat their margin for a few months.' 'It's hard to overstate the level of anxiety businesses have,' Malladi added. Small businesses, without the supply chain mastery of larger companies, have struggled in particular to afford higher tariff costs and have said they are reducing supply or raising prices. Many have complained that American alternatives for some foreign imports may be unavailable or are too expensive. 'While larger retailers may have the scale, capital and pricing power to absorb or strategically offset these pressures, small and mid-sized players remain significantly more vulnerable, with limited flexibility to manage rising input costs or supply disruptions,' Telsey said in TAG's latest Product Pricing Analysis report. Telsey noted that prices, when they eventually start to rise, won't all gain equally or across the board. Only select goods will start to gain in price to start, likely beginning in late August or September. 'Inventory is ordered typically anywhere from six months to one year in advance, and it is expected that the select pricing pieces will begin to show up in late summer,' she said. Fed Chair Powell on Wednesday agreed that the tipping point for broad consumer price increases could come this summer as inventories of pre-tariff warehoused goods dry up. 'We do expect to see more of that over the course of the summer,' Powell said. 'It takes some time for tariffs to work their way through the chain of distribution to the end consumer.' Normally, retailers hold about 1 to 2 months' worth of inventory on items, noted Kristy Akullian, head of iShares Investment Strategy, Americas, so prices could begin to rise in the coming weeks. Another indication that prices could start to spike: In April's Institute for Supply Management services report, prices paid by businesses increased the most since November 2022, and business inventories contracted. 'Low inventories make it harder for companies to keep prices steady, so going forward, we expect the inflation impacts from tariffs to become more apparent,' Akullian said. Powell agreed with that timeline, noting companies that report on their business sentiment to the Fed have said they expect to pass those tariff costs on down the supply chain. 'Many, many companies do expect to put all or — some of the effect of tariffs through to the next person in the chain, and ultimately, to the consumer,' Powell said. 'So we're beginning to see some effects. We expect to see more.' Despite initial success at maintaining low prices, Treasury's Lavorgna conceded inflation could begin to rise down the road because of tariffs. 'I'm not saying there can't be a tariff effect on the numbers at some point,' he said. CNN's Phil Mattingly, Matt Egan and Chris Isidore contributed to this report. Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
