Following a temporary injunction ordered by a New York district court judge last week, the Shriver Job Corps Center in Devens is up and running again, but its future remains uncertain after changing the lives of disadvantaged youth in Central Massachusetts and elsewhere since 1996.
Harrison Ingels of Gardner is among those for whom Job Corps was life changing. When he was 18, shortly after graduating from high school, he lost both his parents. “Quite honestly, I had nowhere to go,” he said at a June press event held at the center. He was homeless. “Job Corps for me was a roof over my head that wasn’t in a car.”
Encouraged by Colleen Lanza—an adjustment counselor at the time and now the center’s director—Ingels joined the Job Corps in 2008, enrolling as a residential student at the Shriver center. After completing the introductory and career preparation courses required of all students, he entered and completed the Job Corps office administration training program, which prepares students for office work. “Typing, Excel, and PowerPoint,” he said.
Next, Ingels was encouraged to enter Shriver’s Advanced College Training program, which allows students who qualify to prepare for and transition directly into higher education. In Ingels’ case that led to two years at Mount Wachusett Community College (“The Mount”), where he earned an associates degree. During this time, he continued to live at Devens with full room and board, health care, and a living allowance. A Job Corps van transported him each day to and from MWCC’s Gardner campus.
Harrison Ingels speaks about his experience with the Shriver Job Corps Center as U.S. Rep. Lori Trahan, Job Corps graduate Peter Macapulay, and U.S. Rep. Jim McGovern listen. (Photos by Lisa Aciukewicz)
From “The Mount” Ingels transferred to Worcester State College, where he earned a bachelor’s degree and teaching certificate. Today, he is a member of the Gardner High School faculty, where he teaches ninth-grade honors English and coaches football. Shutting down the Job Corps, he says, is “inexplicable.”
But that seems to be the intent of the administration in Washington. Ingels was one of three Shriver graduates who spoke in defense of the program at a June 18 press event organized by U.S. Representatives Lori Trahan and Jim McGovern, and held across the road from Shriver in Devens. The event drew a small crowd of instructors, graduates, union officials, local business leaders, and others with a stake in the center.
While the New York district court’s injunction will keep the 123 Job Corps centers across the U.S. open until the case is settled, without Congressional pushback the program’s days seem numbered. First, the Department of Labor has suspended background checks. Because the law requires them, without background checks Shriver and the other centers are unable to admit new students. As of midweek there was no indication the DOL intended to resume them.
Moreover, the Department of Labor has said it intends to shutter the Job Corps entirely, asking for only $90 million next fiscal year, enough to manage the orderly closure of all 123 centers but a fraction of the $1.76 billion appropriated by Congress for the current fiscal year, which began July 1, 2025, and will end June 30, 2026.
Academics, training, support services
Job Corps is the nation’s largest tuition-free trade school network, a place for young men and women between the ages of 16 and 24 who may face economic barriers to education and career advancement. Job Corps helps students earn their high school diploma or equivalent, provides vocational training in various fields, and assists with job placement. Beyond academics and training, Job Corps offers support services like career counseling, job placement assistance, and help with housing, child care, and transportation.
The three Massachusetts Job Corps Centers in Grafton, Shriver (Devens), and Westover (Chicopee) alone have the capacity to train approximately 800 students, according to Lindsey Robbins, a spokesperson for Adams and Associates, the company that operates Shriver and Grafton under contract to the DOL.
Shriver employs approximately 120 people. Robbins says the jobs range from academic and vocational training instructors to guidance counselors, dorm staff, food service, safety and security, wellness, and maintenance. At Devens last month, Rep. Trahan stated that Shriver contributes $17 million to the local economy.
Shriver is “back to normal operations,” said Robbins, but with fewer than the 244 students who were enrolled when DOL ordered it to shut down in May. The center has capacity for 272 residential and 28 nonresidential students. Approximately 60 of its residential students have been categorized as either homeless or transitioning from foster care and were still on campus when the center reopened. Of the students sent home, 51 are eligible to return, Robbins said.
Harvard students at Shriver
Mohammed Niazy (left) and Matuillah Kabir speak with the Press.
Among the returning nonresidential students is Mohammad Niazy, the son of an Afghan family living in Harvard. Niazy completed his high school diploma and earned his driver’s license at Shriver shortly before it was ordered to close. Aspiring to a career in engineering, he is back at Shriver to complete the center’s Advanced College Training program and prepare to apply to Middlesex Community College.
Matuillah Kabir, son of a second Harvard Afghan family, has decided not to return. He too earned a high school diploma at Shriver but then, because of a change to state graduation requirements, learned he had qualified for a Bromfield diploma as well. Kabir says he wants to study law. He is a competitive wrestler and hopes to attend Springfield Junior College, where wrestling is an interscholastic sport. At Shriver, Kabir was a member of the center’s soccer team and, according to family friend Terry Symula, “a bit of a student leader.”
Symula told the Press that the English language skills of both young men improved considerably during their time at Shriver, and it was instructive, she said, for them to mingle with students less fortunate than themselves. She has encouraged them to pursue one of the center’s nearly one dozen training programs—including four in information technology—to gain employable skills they can put to work as they pursue their dreams, but so far the pair seem intent on qualifying for admission to community college.
Encouraging a strong work ethic
Approximately half the training offered at Shriver is dedicated to the skilled trades, including construction, advanced manufacturing, and automotive repair, spokesperson Robbins told the Press. Approximately a fourth is dedicated to the health care industry. The remaining fourth covers service industries such as IT, security, hospitality, finance, and transportation.
Shriver graduates have found employment at local businesses including the Ayer Valley Rehab and Nursing of Ayer, Sweeney Drywall of Boxborough, Closets by Design of Shirley, Herb Chambers car dealerships, and Keolis Commuter Services of Boston, which operates the 14 lines of the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority commuter rail service.
Shriver’s pre-apprentice carpentry program, offered with the support of the United Brotherhood of Carpenters, has a particularly strong reputation. Peter Macapulay is among its graduates. A Shirley native, he completed the Job Corps program in 2020 and following a four-year apprenticeship recently qualified as a journeyman carpenter with the union. He is currently employed in Devens on a project at Bristol-Meyers Squibb. At the June press event, Macapulay said that before learning of Job Corps he had been adrift. “I don’t know where I would be without the program,” he said. “I joined at the age of 24, the cut off age. I only wish I had joined sooner.”
Speaking with the Press at the same event, UBC Regional Manager of Local 336 Worcester David Minasian praised the work ethic of Job Corps graduates. “We always say we can teach you the trade. … We can’t teach you what’s in your head and what’s in your heart. [A] lot of the kids that … come out of Job Corps have dealt with adversity. They have grit. Those are the kind of people that succeed in construction. They’re able to put one foot in front of the other, whether it’s cold or hot. They know how to get to work, and they’re really passionate about changing their lives. And it’s hard to find those two things together.”
“We’ve seen it firsthand,” said Trahan in her remarks at last month’s gathering. “Job Corps graduates become union carpenters, plumbers, health care workers, cyber security professionals, and small business owners. They contribute to our communities; they pay taxes; they raise families; and they fill critical jobs in our work force. Shutting down the facilities that make that possible is reckless and wrong. It pulls the rug out from under young people who are doing everything right.”
