Reaching One Million Active Apprentices Starts with Retention—And Investments in the Right Supports

In April 2025, the Trump Administration set an ambitious target: one million active apprentices. The Executive Order is aimed at modernizing America’s workforce programs to prepare people for the high-paying, skilled trade jobs of the future, with a sharper focus on aligning education, training, and industry needs. 

But reaching one million apprentices isn’t just about scaling enrollment—it’s about retention. Today, nearly half of all apprentices drop out before completing their program. Without targeted investments in the right supports to help learners persist, the full potential of apprenticeship as a vehicle for economic mobility and workforce development will be unrealized, and this ambitious goal will remain out of reach. 

Apprenticeship in Focus 

Often called “the other four-year degree,” apprenticeship is a powerful “earn and learn” model that equips learners with in-demand skills while they earn a paycheck. It reduces barriers to education and training, creates pathways into family-sustaining careers, and provides employers with a steady pipeline of cost-effective talent to meet critical business needs. When apprentices thrive, the benefits ripple across the entire economy.  

Apprenticeship is hardly a new concept—the building trades have relied on it for over a century. But in recent years, the model has gained renewed momentum. Between 2017 and 2023, the number of active apprentices—excluding those in military and federally run prison programs—increased by nearly 40%, from roughly 374,000 to over 519,000. This upward trend shows no signs of slowing, fueled by expanded national attention, ongoing demand for skilled tradespeople, and the model’s expansion into emerging sectors like healthcare, education, and information technology. 

To capitalize on this resurgence, stakeholders need reliable data to guide their decision-making. The Department of Labor’s Registered Apprenticeship Partners Information Database System (RAPIDS) is the most comprehensive national resource available, but it’s plagued by inconsistencies. Manual, decentralized data entry with little validation leads to messy reporting, compounded by fragmented oversight across states. 

Despite significant modernization efforts between 2017 and 2024, major gaps persist. State leaders report discrepancies between their records and RAPIDS dashboards, and the system still omits key fields like pre-apprenticeship completion and long-term outcomes. Without this information, we’re left with an incomplete picture of who apprenticeships serve, who gets left behind, and why. 

RAPIDS is far from perfect. Yet when interpreted with care, it can surface meaningful insights. One of these insights is most urgent: a troubling number of apprentices never make it to the finish line. 

The Cancellation Crisis 

Broadly speaking, apprentice completion rates are low. Of the ~167,000 apprentices who started a registered apprenticeship program in 2017, just ~78,000, or 46.8%, completed the program within 6 years. This completion rate is especially low given the generous measurement timeframe, as most apprenticeship programs are designed to be completed in four years or less. While some apprentices stay enrolled and may eventually finish, most drop (or “cancel”) out of their program. Across the country, apprentices are more likely to cancel than complete their program. 

Why do learners cancel? Publicly available data doesn’t tell us much: RAPIDS doesn’t track reasons for cancellation. To learn more about why apprentices cancel, our team spoke with labor unions, workforce development boards, researchers, funders, and other apprenticeship stakeholders. They highlighted various reasons for cancellation, such as lack of childcare or transportation, as well as financial hardship and other sudden life events.  

These reasons aren’t exclusive to apprenticeship: many other post-secondary learners face similar challenges. But apprenticeships also have unique features that may influence cancellation decisions. Notably, the on-the-job training component of apprenticeship means that “job fit” may be driving cancellation in a way not seen in other postsecondary programs.  

For instance, apprentices in the building trades often face demanding physical labor, unpredictable work schedules, and long commutes to job sites—challenges that classroom-based learners typically avoid. These real-world adjustments can be jarring, especially early in the program, and may lead to cancellations driven by poor job fit. This example from the building trades could help explain a broader pattern observed across industries: cancellations tend to spike in the early months of apprenticeship and decline sharply thereafter. 

Understanding and addressing the root causes of cancellation remains one of the most urgent challenges in the apprenticeship space. While expanding the top of the funnel is a critical step toward improving access, it’s increasingly clear that the apprenticeship model cannot simply scale its way out of the cancellation crisis. Without meaningful structural changes, rising enrollment is likely to be matched—or even outpaced—by a surge in cancellations, especially as existing wraparound supports stretch to accommodate more participants. 

Staying Power: Small Improvements, Big Wins 

Reducing cancellations is no small task. But even modest improvements in retention could yield significant results. In 2023 alone, more than 115,000 apprentices left their programs before completion. By 2030, as apprenticeship continues to grow, that number could climb past 175,000—thousands of missed opportunities for learners and unfilled jobs for employers. But what if we could retain just a small fraction of those apprentices?  

The chart below illustrates how marginal reductions in cancellations can lead to meaningful increases in program completions and long-term workforce impact. 

From Insight to Action 

Improving apprentice retention and completion can deliver meaningful results—not just for learners, but also for employers, labor unions, and the broader workforce. We can get there, but we need a better understanding of what drives apprentice retention. National apprenticeship data is limited, and program design and outcomes vary widely by industry, occupation, and geography. To address this challenge, Social Finance is collaborating with apprenticeship programs and key stakeholders to pinpoint the root causes of apprentice attrition and assess the tangible value of targeted supports. 

By providing actionable insights, we aim to guide strategic investments that bolster apprenticeship completion. If you are interested in joining us or want to stay up to date on our findings, please reach out to Will Grimes at wgrimes@socialfinance.org. 

Learn more about Social Finance’s work to strengthen the apprenticeship pipeline >