Former Trump official: Washington finally let Pell Grants pay for welding school, then buried the idea in 85 pages of red tape

Caroline Casagrande, a former U.S. Deputy Assistant Secretary of State and four-term New Jersey Assemblywoman, is the founder and CEO of VectorEDU, which advises education and workforce companies.

Ask anyone trying to staff a plant floor, a job site, or a service fleet what keeps them up at night, and near the top of the list is the same answer: they cannot find enough skilled hands. Welders, electricians, HVAC technicians, line workers- the people who keep physical America running – are in chronically short supply, and the pipeline that produces them has long been starved of one obvious fuel: federal student aid.

That is set to change July 1. For the first time in more than half a century, a Pell Grant will be able to pay for short, hands-on training that leads straight into those jobs – a 12-week welding course, not just a four-year degree. The Education Department calls it one of the most significant changes to the program in its history. For employers staring at unfilled positions, it is potentially the most useful thing Washington has done for the talent pipeline in a generation.

The timing could hardly be better, because higher education has its own version of the shortage. The demographic cliff has arrived; public confidence in colleges has fallen from 57% in 2015 to a record-low 36% in 2024 and back only to 42% last year; and seven in 10 Americans tell Pew the system is headed the wrong way – often, they say, because it no longer leads to a job. Workforce Pell answers the employer’s empty requisition and the public’s doubt at the same time.

But the same Washington nearly buried it. The idea had been bipartisan for a decade, backed by Tim Kaine and Susan Collins, Roger Marshall and Tina........

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