Joey Cook was 17 and a junior in high school when he heard about a way to learn a profession while getting paid: by landing an apprenticeship, a path into the workforce that everyone was suddenly talking about as an alternative to college.
"I didn't want to go get an associate degree," he says. "I didn't want to get a bachelor's degree." Cook wanted a certification in heating, ventilation and air-conditioning, an in-demand field in his rural Texas hometown of Hamlin.
Read more at NPR.