The 548 Foundation began offering trainings through the state workforce-development program in 2023, said Patton, and now the foundation holds multiple sessions each year in Chicago and the suburbs of Aurora, Elgin, and Waukegan, home to large Latino immigrant and African American populations. Another Chicago session will begin this month.
Under the state program, students get a stipend along with support to help them overcome barriers like child care and car trouble. The programs feature not only technical instruction but basic skills from math to resume-writing. Wraparound services help trainees with mental health, housing, and other needs. Across Illinois, these offerings have been crucial to helping people not only acquire skills and certifications but get and keep jobs, according to Patton and other workforce-development leaders.
In August 2024, I attended a job fair that 548 put on for their graduates. There, multiple solar employers did interviews that they said would promptly result in job offers, and instructors revealed some of the secrets to their success. They noted that the supportive services continue after graduation — trainees can keep coming back to 548 staff and affiliates for aid and advice. And the instructors work hard to prepare their charges for all the nuances of the job. For example, they role-play conflict mediation and start hands-on classes at 6 a.m., when work in the field often begins — so the participants can build routines around early-morning child care and other family responsibilities.
At the graduation, Patton touted the program’s results, and how it has dispelled stereotypes about Chicago’s Black communities.
“They said we didn’t want to work. Somehow, we have a 500-person waiting list to get in this program. Then they said we weren’t smart enough to learn this stuff. We have a 70% graduation rate, 700 graduates. Then they said the market wasn’t ready for us. Meanwhile, we have a 68% placement rate. Our students get jobs within 33 days of graduation. They’re averaging $68,000 a year. So while others are talking, we work. That’s what we do.”
He warned graduates to stay focused on their goals and careers despite such prejudice, as well as potential “distractions,” like friends who just want to party or long-lost relatives who suddenly appear to borrow money.
The cautionary notes soon dissolved into applause and music, as it was time for the diplomas. Instructors from different cohorts came to the pulpit to read the names of their trainees. Each graduate shook hands in a long receiving line including Patton and various elected officials, while people cheered loudly from the pews.
“I’m super proud of her!” enthused Natane Brown after dashing into the aisle to embrace her sister, Asia Bell.
After the ceremony the crowd spilled onto the sidewalk, where graduates were showered with flowers and balloons and posed for photos with family and friends.
Graduate Anthony Legorreta hoisted his young nephew in his arms as his relatives crowded. “This was most definitely a life-changing experience,” he said.
Fellow graduate Kelvin Davis said he loved the hands-on installation training, but sees himself “doing something toward desk work” in the solar industry – “not so much the physicality.”
“They were very open to whoever wants to learn. It’s an open door for the community,” said Davis of the program.
Graduate Mikah Allen doesn’t necessarily see himself working in solar at all. He prefers iron work and construction, and the links with trade union apprenticeships embedded in the training should help with that too. The state recently revamped the clean energy curriculum to prepare workers for a wider range of careers, given the current volatility of some clean energy industries.
At the graduation, Pastor Barrett described 548’s classes as part of the quest to build generational wealth in disenfranchised Black communities. He shared how his grandfather came to Chicago from the cotton fields of Mississippi with a third-grade education, and through a labor union job was able to buy a home and raise a family, including Barrett’s father, a renowned gospel singer, pastor, and civil rights activist.
“We come from neighborhoods that people write off,” Barrett said. “But you all have changed the trajectory not only of yourselves but of the community.” He predicted that “the next generation of contractors, the next generation of developers, the next generation of millionaires is sitting right in this room.”
At a time when discussion of the American solar industry often revolves around slashed federal incentives, troubled supply chains, and projects blocked by community opposition, the scene in the church that morning provided an inspiring and refreshing antidote. It was a reminder that even in the face of great challenges, clean energy can help improve not only the climate but individuals’ lives.
“You have people here who have just come home from prison, who have been left off to the side in society,” Patton told me outside the church, between congratulating graduates with caps and diplomas in hand. “Now they’re crossing the threshold. What you saw today was hope. That gets you a long way.”