Deere and Company invests in local students with their apprenticeship program

Deere and Company are investing big in local students as their new apprenticeship program helps to build important hard skills as well as help them build a brighter future. Deere’s apprenticeship is much more than your traditional welding instruction though as they have partnered with Iowa State University to include a communications aspect to the program.

“We partnered with our local high schools. It allows us to develop that continuing pipeline of skilled employees." said Barry Neal who works with the Deere Harvester Apprenticeship Program. Neal says it's also a way to help keep future generations in the Quad Cities rather than moving away. But recognizes even if students move away, they still need the skills to be productive citizens. "We're paying high schools’ students to come develop their skills... we focus on welding but there are also development skills that we work on”

A benefit of participating in this program is that students in the program are then put on a short-list for work openings are John Deere. Program participants earn an hourly wage of around $13 and gain school credit for their hours worked after completing a threshold of 2,000 hours.

Read full story here: https://www.wqad.com/article/news/education/deere-and-companys-apprenticeship-program-gets-a-twist-with-new-partnership-with-iowa-state-university/526-299448b7-fd36-4c65-b309-8fb6cb0c619a