Rewriting The Record: How Apprenticeships Unlock New Futures (Co-Authored by Joshua Johnson, JFF, June 30, 2025)
A call to expand apprenticeship access behind the wall—transforming overlooked potential into lasting opportunity.
This impactful piece explores how registered apprenticeships serve as a transformative pathway for people returning from incarceration, helping them develop in-demand skills, reconnect with industry, and build long-term career momentum. The authors make a compelling argument that expanding apprenticeship access is not just a fairness issue — it’s an essential workforce solution amid labor shortages and equity gaps in employer systems. Featuring both data and real narratives, it serves as a call to action for corrections leaders, employers, and apprenticeship sponsors to design intentional, inclusive systems.
Joshua draws on his lived experience—spending nearly a decade incarcerated before launching a career through apprenticeship and advancing to system leadership—to shape and humanize the analysis. The essay follows his path from prison to the union hall to government, illustrating how employer trust and intentional system design can unlock new futures for justice-impacted individuals.
How Registered Apprenticeship Led Me From Black History to Black Opportunity (Authored by Joshua Johnson, JFF, February 22, 2023
A personal reflection linking Black labor history to modern workforce justice, making the case for radically inclusive Registered Apprenticeship models.
In this reflective piece, Joshua Johnson connects his apprenticeship journey to Wisconsin’s long arc of Black resistance and labor equity—anchored by the story of Joshua Glover, an enslaved man whose legacy lives in a mural on a bridge he helped build. Joshua traces how apprenticeship became a real, navigable pathway for him—and millions of others—and how it now has the potential to break down racial disparities in job access and wage outcomes. The essay critiques systemic bias in apprenticeship, highlights statistical inequities, and calls employers and unions to design with intentional inclusion.
Joshua shares not just policy insight, but first-hand transformation—from laborer to state workforce leader. His lived leadership imbues the analysis with urgency, credibility, and systemic wisdom.
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