Skilled through alternative routes

Skilled through alternative routes (STAR) is a term to describe adults in the United States without bachelor's degrees who have work experience and skills that position them for transitions to higher-wage jobs.^[1] First defined in a 2020 research paper by Peter Q. Blair in the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER), STARs made up approximately 70 million workers in the U.S. economy as of 2021.^[2][3]

Description

The majority of American workers (approximately 64% as of 2020) do not have a four-year bachelor's degree,^[4][5] including 68 percent of Black workers and 79 percent of Hispanic workers.^[6]

STARs have gained skills through a variety of routes other than the four-year college degree, often including community college, workforce training, bootcamps, certificate programs, military service or on-the-job learning. Research from December 2020 indicates that 30 million STARs have the skills to earn 70 percent more than their current wages.^[7] However, 60 percent of STARs who changed jobs over the past decade transitioned to new positions with the same or lower wages than their previous position.^[8]

Proponents of supporting STARs argue that a more intentional approach to hiring, training, and recruiting STARs can help to increase the representation of non-white individuals in the workforce.^[9][10]