Teen Trucking Program Has Flat Tire

WASHINGTON – An effort to recruit teenagers for long-haul trucking jobs has had a slow start, with only 36 young adults signing up for a program that was expected to serve thousands.

Congress created the Safe Driver Apprenticeship Pilot Program as part of the bipartisan infrastructure law President Joe Biden signed in 2021, touting drivers aged 18 to 20 as a cure for supply chain woes and an alleged shortage of drivers.

Prominent voices in the freight industry have long complained that the minimum age requirement for interstate trucking, which is 21, is a barrier to recruitment, and the apprenticeship initiative was supposed to be a step toward lowering the driving age.

The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration said it expected up to a thousand companies to participate in the pilot, which would test whether younger drivers could be safe enough on the road. Studies generally show that younger drivers are much likelier to be involved in crashes.

Since the apprenticeship program’s launch in July 2022, however, only 112 motor carriers have even applied, according to data from the SDAP. Out of that, only 34 have been approved, with another 36 “pre-qualified,” meaning they could participate soon. So far, just 13 drivers have graduated. The program’s only supposed to last for three years.

It could be that recent high school graduates don’t want to be long-haulers in a hot economy.

Rodger Nicholson, an executive at Ohio freight carrier AWL Transport, which has more than 200 trucks, told HuffPost that qualifying for the apprenticeship program was easy – the problem is that they can’t find apprentices.

“ We thought we’d have people knocking down our doors,” Nicholson said. “We’re just shocked that nobody has raised