The traditional high school-to-college-to-employment route has hit a number of potholes recently, among them cripplingly high college tuition and growing concern that higher education is disconnected from emerging work opportunities. Although demand for jobs requiring bachelor’s degrees is rising at twice the rate of those requiring only high school diplomas, there’s a growing sense among some companies, including Zurich, that baccalaureates aren’t necessarily the best way for students to gather meaningful job skills and experience.

“It’s a very expensive and inefficient proxy,” said Matthew Sigelman, chief executive of Burning Glass Technologies, which analyzes labor market trends. “It means employers pay more for talent and take longer to fill jobs. If we can develop channels that provide employers with the talent they need, with the right training to get the job done in ways that are more efficient, that’s a win for both sides.”

Last year, the company worked with Harvard Business School to issue a report concluding that 3.2 million jobs, including many white-collar positions such as graphic designer, human resource specialist and paralegal, could be filled by apprentices. That’s an eight-fold increase over the number today. But whether apprenticeships can take hold in a big way, workforce and education experts say, depends on several factors: government investment, greater interest from companies and high-quality programs that give workers portable skills that benefit them, not just their employers.

Read the full article about apprenticeships as new on-ramp to jobs by Caroline Preston at The Hechinger Report.