Trades2Trainer™ began with a simple but powerful realization: skilled industry professionals often enter the classroom unprepared for the realities of teaching. Co-founders Brian Rick and JoAnna Collins, an expert in the trades and a healthcare professional, met through the ACTE NextLevel Leadership Fellowship and quickly discovered they had faced the same challenge when transitioning into education. Despite their different backgrounds, both were provided little to no formal training on how to teach students with no industry experience. After years of working in Career and Technical Education (CTE) and advancing to program leadership roles, Brian and JoAnna shared a common mission: to create change for new teachers. Determined to tackle this critical barrier to retaining quality industry-experts as CTE instructors, they secured an ECMC Foundation Grant to research and validate what new CTE teachers truly need to succeed.

Today, Trades2Trainer™ is more than a program, it is a movement. With a growing reach across the U.S. and internationally, the initiative aims to be the premier one-stop resource for transforming tradespeople into impactful trainers, empowering the next generation of skilled professionals. Looking ahead, we are excited to welcome new connections who will expand our offerings to support teachers beyond survival in year one to truly thriving in year two and beyond. We are also exploring opportunities to bring Trades2Trainer™ to corporate training audiences, extending our impact across workforce development and industry education.