More New Mexicans turn to CNM trade schools amid shifting job market

After leaving the U.S. Air Force, Stephanie Corral began taking classes toward a fine arts degree at the now-defunct Art Institute of Phoenix in Arizona. While in school, Corral struggled to support herself, she said, and eventually stopped taking classes and took a job at a Bank of America call center to support her infant daughter.

“I just didn’t have the support, economically, to not be working for four years with a baby,” she said.

Corral, who worked as an aircraft systems specialist in the military, spent the following years working various tech support and customer service jobs and took classes to learn how to code. She moved to Albuquerque in the fall of 2023 with her daughter.

Corral was working at a phone repair store, struggling to pay rent with what she earned, when she enrolled in Central New Mexico Community College’s Internet of Things technology program.

“I knew that I needed to get into a place where I could get paid a little more and be able to live,” Corral said. “It was a leap of faith, 100%, to go into this training course.”

Corral is one of a growing number of New Mexicans choosing trade school or vocational programs for their stability and earning potential. Enrollment at CNM’s workforce training programs — which are not for academic credit, but lead to certifications and careers in industries like health care, construction, technology and commercial trucking — is up nearly 27% since 2019, according to CNM spokesperson Brad Moore.

“We’ve seen a definite interest in education and training,” said Joy Forehand, vice president of workforce and community success at CNM. “Our goal is 100% of our learners have a work-based learning experience by the time they graduate.”

The majority of the more than 5,800 enrollees in CNM’s workforce training programs also have jobs, Forehand said, and many are coming to the training programs in search of stable employment after years in the workforce.

“I think, definitely, the workforce training programs offer a quicker entry point into a lot of jobs,” Forehand said.

The classes also have support at the state level — the state of New Mexico awarded CNM $11.8 million for the past fiscal year to provide financial assistance to students looking to enroll in workforce training programs. CNM received $6.8 million from the state’s government results and opportunity fund and $5 million from the New Mexico Higher Education Department, Moore said.

The money goes toward tuition assistance, scholarships and internships, according to CNM officials. Last year, nearly 2,600 students received scholarships for workforce training programs through state funding, Forehand said.

Four-year college enrollment remains relatively steady nationwide, according to a recent estimate by the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center, though college is more expensive than ever.

Enrollment at two-year colleges across the country has declined steadily over the last decade.

Public four-year college enrollment in New Mexico is down more than 3% since spring 2020, though public two-year college enrollment fell almost 16% in that same time period, according to the NSC data. Enrollment data from CNM shows a 17% decline in students in associate degree programs since 2019.

Vocational program enrollment is up nationwide by about 20% over the last five years, NSC found, indicating that students are turning toward technical skills, especially in the face of an unstable economy and a workforce that stands to be transformed by artificial intelligence.

CNM’s quantum technician bootcamp, which Corral attended, accepts students with no experience and teaches them a 10-week crash course on optics, photonics, ultra-high vacuum systems and quantum.

“(The boot camps) offer a pathway for a student like Stephanie, who really can’t wait two years, three years, four years to really change her economic conditions, and is looking for a faster pathway and willing to put in the work to do that,” said Brian Rashap, who leads the quantum program.

Rashap said he’s seen an uptick in students looking for vocational training and technical skills in recent years. As low-tech trade jobs like machinists become automated, employers need technicians to work the computers, and job-seekers are looking for skills that they feel are safe from AI, he said.

“I think people are feeling that more white collar jobs are under attack by AI,” Rashap said. “I believe that people look at these trade-type jobs and they feel like they’re more future-proof. You know, AI is never going to fix your transmission on your car, right?”

The state is also pushing students toward workforce training. The New Mexico Department of Workforce Solutions last week launched a $400,000 Rural Education-Workforce Collaborative to pair students at rural schools with job training programs and apprenticeships.

On a local level, the city of Albuquerque and CNM operate Job Training Albuquerque, a program that supplies employers with free workforce training for their employees in high-demand fields, like technology, construction and health care. Since its founding in 2020, the program has trained nearly 4,000 workers from 397 small businesses in the city, and has created 1,600 new jobs, city officials said last month.

“We’re creating a city where residents don’t have to leave to find opportunity and where employers have access to the skilled workforce they need to thrive,” said city Economic Development Director Max Gruner.

Corral, now 36, is a technical intern at Woodruff Engineering in Santa Fe through the program, where she works on building, testing and maintaining electrical and mechanical systems. She is paid a small stipend for the internship and receives rental assistance through the VA while she’s in school.

Corral says she’s grateful for the connections she’s made at CNM, which helped her secure her internship. When she’s finished, she says she hopes to either continue studying engineering or complete her schooling in art.

“In a four-year college… you don’t get that connection or that assistance with getting a job in the field that you’re learning about until your four years are up,” she said. “I’m able to do this internship because of all the connections and the support that I was able to have here that I did not have in Phoenix.”