Yellow Corporation has expanded the number of its company-sponsored driving academies with three new locations.
The latest academies to open are in Columbus, Ohio; Tracy, California; and Maybrook, New York. The company said these facilities are home to its largest regional distribution centers, making these ideal locations for student apprentices to learn.
Once enrolled, students will learn the operations side of the business, complete an initial 160 hours of training, and spend an additional month honing their driving skills with a Yellow-certified safety trainer to prepare them for their commercial driver’s license exam. After graduating and obtaining a CDL, each qualified driver will be offered a position at Yellow.
Each of Yellow’s driving academies is certified as a Department of Labor apprenticeship program, which is designed to provide paid on-the-job instruction for workers as they prepare for a highly in-demand job.
“We’re thrilled to own and operate a total of 20 permanent Driving Academies, which are free to all students,” said Tamara Jalving, vice president of safety and talent acquisition at Yellow. “In the last year, we have opened eight new Academies, with more scheduled to open later this year in other parts of the country. Training our own drivers is simply the best way to tackle the driver shortage in America.”
The program is tuition-free.
“We plan to bring in new drivers and certainly more diverse candidates as we aim to train 1,000 new drivers this year,” said Darren Hawkins, CEO of Yellow. “We’re introducing a wider and broader audience to the trucking industry, not just recruiting talent from other trucking companies.
“We need to grow the overall population of applicants for commercial driver’s licenses. That’s what we’re doing and that’s the intention of our Driving Academies.”
