Most workforce training programs measure success at the finish line: Did the student complete the course? Did they earn a certificate? WorkTexas asks a different set of questions, ones that don’t get answered for months or years after graduation.
Mike Feinberg, co-founder of WorkTexas, has built a post-graduation follow-up structure into the program since its launch in 2020. Staff check in with graduates every six months, asking whether they’re still employed, whether their wages have gone up, whether they need help with a workplace problem. That commitment runs for at least five years.
“We’re not just looking at how the students are doing with us this year,” Feinberg says. “We make a commitment to follow our students for at least five years. We’re interested in what that looks like in terms of career contentment, and especially in terms of earning power and creating sustainable lives for themselves, their families, and future generations.”
What Mike Feinberg’s Five-Year Commitment Looks Like in Practice
WorkTexas launched in 2020, which means its earliest adult evening-program graduates are now five or more years out. That cohort represents the first full cycle of the longitudinal follow-up Feinberg committed to at the outset, and the data is beginning to reflect it.
Of 900 adult alumni of the WorkTexas training classes, over 600 reported that they currently employed. About 100 have returned for a second round of training to move into higher-paying roles. Adults employed for a year or more after completing the program earn an average of $27 per hour. WorkTexas reported a 91% adult training completion rate in 2024–25.
The follow-up work is handled by career coaches, and the conversations range considerably in scope. Some check-ins are practical: a graduate wants to know whether to take a different job, or needs help updating a resume. Others go deeper.
“It is job coaching, which can be technical, or it can also turn into therapy at times,” Feinberg says. “We’re also reacting when they call in and say, ‘I just had a fight with my boss,’ or ‘I don’t like the job; there’s another opening across the street, do you think I should apply for it?’ We’re having those conversations with people, too.”
Shirmeca Littlejohn, a WorkTexas career-success coach, frames the commitment to incoming students directly at orientation. “If you decide to stay, this is a five-year relationship,” she has told cohorts. “Five years of us checking in with you: Are you working? Are you happy at your job? Are you working on a promotion? Do you need resources?”
Why Mike Feinberg Tracks Wages, Not Just Certificates
Feinberg has a specific critique of how most workforce training programs account for their own performance. Certificate completion rates, he argues, tell you almost nothing about whether participants built durable careers.
“You go to community colleges, trade schools, and ask them, ‘Are you successful? How do you know you’re doing a good job?'” he says. “And they say, ‘97.8% of our students earn a certificate.’ How many of those people got jobs? They don’t know. We didn’t want to fall into that trap.”
The WorkTexas approach starts with employers. More than 100 companies have helped shape the curriculum, and partner organizations supply job opportunities when participants complete training. The follow-up system is designed to catch graduates before small problems become reasons to quit.
Childcare and transportation remain persistent barriers. After an early attempt to run an on-site childcare center at Gallery Furniture didn’t draw enough participants, the program shifted to connecting students with subsidies and childcare options closer to where they work. The program provides public transit passes and a bus for work-based internships. Feinberg acknowledges those challenges aren’t fully solved.
The early success stories are starting to accumulate. One WorkTexas graduate who took a construction course went from knowing little about the industry to managing a homebuilding project within months. Within a year and a half of completing the program, she was earning a six-figure salary as a regional manager. A building maintenance trainee won a national award from Camden Living, a company that manages apartment communities across multiple states.
Feinberg says WorkTexas is now at a point where the volume of alumni is beginning to strain the follow-up system. “We have so many alumni that we’re trying to figure out how we keep up with supporting them all,” he said. It is, by most measures, a welcome problem to have.