As torrential rains inundated Kentucky in April, Union County Judge-Executive Adam O’Nan needed labor to fill and distribute sandbags to protect homes and businesses from flooding.
After a phone call, local students from the Earle C. Clements Job Corps Center stepped up to the task.
“They loaded those bags for them and were a tremendous help,” O’Nan said.
Now the hundreds of students and employees at the center in Union County will be scattering to uncertain futures after the Trump administration on May 29 announced that it would “pause” Job Corps operations across the country.
O’Nan, a Republican, said that would be a loss for his county.
“It really is difficult to measure the value because we’re just so used to them being around, and not that we take them for granted, but they’re just part of us,” O’Nan said. “If, in fact, this is the end of Job Corps, that’s just going to be a big void for us.”
The abrupt halt would be an even bigger loss for the center’s mostly low-income students who are feeling panic, anger and desperation about their futures, said Jonathan Brown, the finance and administration director for the Clements center.
“Either they have nowhere to go — they’re homeless or house insecure, they don’t have safe places to go — or they’re just not done with their trade,” Brown said. “I couldn’t imagine going to college for two years, halfway done, and then my school closes and loses its accreditation and none of my classes count.”
Brown said the contracts to run the center, including contracts for employees, are being cancelled with a deadline of June 30 to have students returned to their home states. Guidance from the U.S. Department of Labor states the department will cover the cost to send students back to their home states by the end of the month and connect them with other job training and educational opportunities.
The Jobs Corps center in the county seat of Morganfield is one of dozens across the country — including two others in Kentucky in Floyd and Muhlenberg counties — funded by the federal government that have offered young people free training in a wide variety of career paths including culinary arts, welding, nursing, electrical work, diesel mechanics and more.
Brown said the center is the second largest in the country in terms of students served. He said the center had been contracted to serve more than 1,000 students, bringing in usually 30-40 new students each week. He said about 275 employees serve those students.
Created 61 years ago as a part of President Lyndon Johnson’s War on Poverty, Job Corps enrolls people between the ages of 16 and 24 who are dealing with challenges such as poverty, homelessness, a disability or falling behind on reading and writing skills.
In announcing the “pause,” the Trump administration cited data from 2023 that it argues shows cost overruns and low graduation rates.
But Brown, the Job Corps administrator in Union County, argues the April report from the Trump administration is largely misleading, cherry-picking data from 2023 when centers were still rebounding from the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Brown also thinks the “pause” of operations is essentially a closure.
‘A failed experiment’
Brown said the headwinds for his center began to pick up months ago with various positions and departments being cut, but he became particularly troubled with the center’s situation when enrollment of new students was halted in March.
He said the Department of Labor stopped doing background checks for new students, essentially stopping the center from bringing in new enrollees.
Then in April, the department issued a report looking at graduation rates and the cost to graduate students from each center, stating that overall the average cost for each student was a little over $80,000 and the average graduation rate was 38.6%.
In early May, the Trump administration sent a budget request to Congress that eliminated funding for the Job Corps, calling it “a failed experiment to help America’s youth.” In testimony before Congress on May 15, Labor Secretary Lori Chavez-DeRemer told lawmakers the president’s budget request signaled a need to “refocus” on “where those dollars are going to have the outcome for the workforce.”
On May 29, Chavez-DeRemer announced the “pause” of Job Corps center operations, citing the report from April as evidence of the ineffectiveness of the Job Corps programs.
“Job Corps was created to help young adults build a pathway to a better life through education, training, and community,” Chavez-DeRemer said in a statement provided in a press release. “However, a startling number of serious incident reports and our in-depth fiscal analysis reveal the program is no longer achieving the intended outcomes that students deserve. We remain committed to ensuring all participants are supported through this transition and connected with the resources they need to succeed as we evaluate the program’s possibilities.”
In Union County, Brown acknowledges there are “inefficiencies” within Job Corps and that some centers perform better than others. But given the United States is the “richest country in the history of the world,” he questioned why the federal government couldn’t provide “this small amount to give people that second chance.”
An information sheet provided to the Lantern from the director of the Earle C. Clements center asserts the average graduation rate for Job Corps centers is higher than the average graduation rate for two-year community and technical colleges. The information sheet also asserts the average cost per student is lower, and comparable to community and technical colleges, when Job Corps enrollees who don’t ultimately graduate are taken into account.
The April report released by the Trump administration says the Earle C. Clements center has a graduation rate of 47% and a cost per enrollee of $67,713 in 2023, both figures better than the national average in the report.
Job Corps’ operations cost roughly $1.53 billion in fiscal year 2024, making up a small fraction of the $6.75 trillion of federal government spending that fiscal year.
“I wish it was a more nuanced look at how to make the program better to meet that national need to provide skilled labor while also serving disadvantaged youth,” said Brown.
A Department of Labor spokesperson did not respond to several emails requesting comment about criticisms of its April report.
Finding meaning in helping students
Amanda Moore, the manager of Amanda’s Floral and Gift Shop in Sturgis, said the loss of Job Corps in Union County “is really going to impact our whole community.”
Her relatively new business hosted two paid internships with Job Corps students, one of whom worked on revamping the store’s website.
“It kind of gives those kids a chance to get out into the real world without some of the struggles that they have at home,” Moore said. “Getting away from where they are and coming to the Job Corps Center and having a chance at life.”
Job Corps students also put together a “wonderful meal,” she said, for a local gathering called “Derby Days” celebrating the running of the Kentucky Derby.
“All the Derby favorites: They made a virgin mint julep, all the cucumber sandwiches that you could eat,” Moore said. “They put their heart and soul into all of that, and that was a big deal downtown here in Sturgis.”
Brown, the finance and administration director for the local center, said the backgrounds of students can vary depending on what circumstances qualify them to enroll. It’s not uncommon for students to show up with only a garbage bag of “old, dirty clothes.”
Finding meaning in helping those students is what has kept Brown, a Union County native, working at the center for 11 years, starting as a career counselor for students. He’s loved the work since “day one.”
“My whole job was about the student, whatever they needed to get through the program, get their credentials, get their high school diploma, get a good job,” Brown said. “It’s stressful and it’s hard, but it’s meaningful. And you can see it every single day — the meaning.”
He believes Job Corps is unique from other educational opportunities because it provides young people a safe place, free of charge, to sleep, have regular meals and work on a career away from the challenges they left behind. To make sure these young people, he said, don’t fall through the cracks.
“I don’t know what a lot of this population will do. I don’t know what options they really have,” Brown said.
This article was originally published by the Kentucky Lantern.
