Lanier Tech launches apprenticeship program with Alcon in Johns Creek

Lanier Technical College has launched a new apprenticeship program with Alcon in Johns Creek, opening a paid path for Forsyth County residents into quality-control and advanced-manufacturing work. Lanier Tech’s economic development team serves Banks, Dawson, Forsyth, Hall, Jackson, Barrow and Lumpkin counties, Georgia’s 22 technical colleges make up the state’s largest network of registered apprenticeship sponsors, and Apprentice Georgia offers employer incentives that can help expand openings.

The registered apprenticeship model pairs paid on-the-job learning with related technical instruction, usually over one to four years. In the APP101 Quality Tech track used across the region, apprentices are full-time employees and part-time college students, with up to three eight-hour class days a month; the curriculum includes process control, measurement, gage calibration, Lean, problem solving, analytic software, communication and presentation skills, and Lean Six Sigma prep. The track is open to existing employees or new hires, with or without quality experience.

Registered apprentices earn a wage from day one and receive progressive wage increases as they build skills. Apprenticeship.gov puts post-completion employment at 93%. The regional APP101 model lists a $12,000 employer cost that can be reimbursed by local, state and federal funds at about 83 percent; Georgia’s apprenticeship incentive adds an initial $2,500 payment per apprentice and up to $10,000 at completion. The employer sign-up form asks for the company name, company email, number of apprentices and apprenticeship location.

Alcon’s Johns Creek site has leaned on Georgia workforce programs for years. The company first partnered with the state in 2012 and later invested $500 million and created 550 jobs. In 1991, when it was called CIBA VISION, Alcon moved its offices to Johns Creek, added more than $250 million and about 300 jobs in a 2013 expansion, and followed with another $250 million expansion for 250 more jobs. At least 80% of the workers tied to that expansion had never worked in the contact lens industry before.

That regional push lines up with Forsyth County’s own economic strategy, which targets life and biosciences and advanced manufacturing, and with Forward Forsyth, the public-private partnership linking county government, the chamber, the development authority, Forsyth County Schools, the University of North Georgia and Lanier Tech. Forsyth County Schools launched Workforce Forsyth with the chamber, Lanier Tech and UNG in 2014, and Lanier Tech’s earlier quality-control apprenticeship already sent four Northeast Georgia manufacturing employees from Murray Plastics, NOK-Freudenberg, IMS Gear and Tsubaki-Nakashima through the same type of training. Alcon’s Johns Creek careers page also lists openings such as calibration technician and electro maintenance technician.