Yellow Corporation is continuing its commitment to train the next generation of safe, professional semi-truck drivers as it expands its company-sponsored Driving Academies with three new locations.
“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.”
Addressing the nationwide shortage of qualified professional truck drivers, estimated at 80,000 by the American Trucking Associations, is at the forefront of Yellow’s Driving Academy strategy. The program is tuition-free, which makes the Academies valuable for students and their local communities. “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.”
The latest Academies to open are in Columbus, OH, Tracy, CA, and Maybrook, NY. These facilities are home to Yellow’s 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 best position them for their commercial driver’s license (CDL) exam. After graduating and obtaining a CDL, each qualified driver will be offered a position behind the wheel 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 need to grow the overall population of applicants for commercial driver’s licenses,” Hawkins explained. “That’s what we’re doing and that’s the intention of our Driving Academies.”
Yellow also has career opportunities available for sales professionals, dock employees, diesel mechanics, and terminal leadership coast-to-coast. Click here for more information.
In addition to the new Driving Academies in Columbus, Maybrook, and Tracy, other Yellow Driving Academies are located in Atlanta/Marietta, Charlotte, Chicago, Cincinnati, Cleveland, Denver, Fort Worth, TX, Hagerstown, MD, Indianapolis, Kansas City, Memphis, Nashville, Pico Rivera, CA, Portland, Salt Lake City, South Bend, IN, and Detroit.
Learn more about the Yellow Driving Academies at https://www.myyellow.com/us/en/careers/driving-academy.
