Britain introduces preliminary training before training, with ministers considering a preparatory course for applicants struggling to understand the preparation
LONDON – The British government has made a historic breakthrough in youth employment policy, after discovering that many young people cannot get an apprenticeship because they lack the qualifications needed to qualify for the training that is meant to give them qualifications.
Former cabinet minister Alan Milburn has proposed a national pre-apprenticeship programme for young people who cannot secure a conventional apprenticeship. The proposal, covered by The Guardian, arrives amid serious concern about youth unemployment and a steep fall in apprenticeship opportunities for teenagers.
According to the figures highlighted in the review, only about one in five apprenticeships is now taken by somebody aged 16 to 18, while the number of apprentices under 19 has roughly halved over the past decade. Ministers have responded by considering a revolutionary intervention, which is to teach young people how to qualify for an opportunity to learn something.
Apprenticeship Scheme Created for People Who Cannot Get Apprenticeships
An apprenticeship used to mean that an inexperienced young person walked into a workplace and learned a trade from somebody who already knew it. A teenager who wanted to be a plumber would go out with an experienced plumber, learn to fit pipes, discover that customers never know where their stopcock is, and in time become a qualified tradesperson.
The modern system has added some sophistication. The teenager must now show enough education, confidence, experience and administrative competence to prove eligibility for the chance to acquire education, confidence, experience and administrative competence. Employers increasingly expect entry-level applicants to have previous experience, which has produced a fascinating labour market in which the only acceptable candidates for a first job are people who have already had one.
Officials believe pre-apprenticeships could repair the difficulty by adding one more stage between school and actual employment. The programme would combine classroom learning, technical instruction and workplace experience, and its main achievement would be to leave young people adequately prepared to begin preparing for work. The government’s own apprenticeship pages already list a wide range of routes, and it is not yet clear where on that list the new stage will sit, or whether applicants will need to apply for it.
Youth Unemployment Fix Requires Young Workers to Complete Training Before Being Allowed to Train
Education specialists have sketched out several possible modules. Students could study the advanced mathematics needed to work out whether an entry-level salary covers the cost of travelling to the job. Another module might explain why employers advertise for three years of experience in software that was released eighteen months ago. A third would introduce the mysteries of online recruitment systems, including the requirement to upload a CV and then type in, by hand, every detail already contained in the CV.
There would also be advanced instruction in workplace communication. Young people would learn to decode important corporate phrases, among them “competitive salary”, which means the salary is competing with the applicant’s ability to afford food. A separate lesson would cover “fast-paced working environment”, traditionally understood to mean that the employer has hired three people to do the work of seven.
Leah Brannigan, 18, from Doncaster, who has applied for fourteen entry-level positions since June, said she had been told twice that she was “overqualified” and once that she was “not yet ready”, all by the same company. She asked whether the pre-apprenticeship would involve a certificate and was told that it probably would, and that she would need to put it on her CV.
NEET Figures Prompt Ministers to Explore Pre-Employment Employment Opportunities
Britain has close to a million young people outside education, employment or training, a figure that carries serious long-term consequences for productivity and economic participation. The Office for National Statistics publishes the numbers regularly and they have not, so far, responded to being published. Ministers have also pledged £100 million to expand local apprenticeship services.
The difficulty is that Britain already has an extensive institutional system devoted to preparing people for economic opportunities that too often fail to appear. Schools prepare pupils for colleges. Colleges prepare students for employers. Employers prepare recruitment websites for applicants, recruitment websites prepare automated rejection emails, and government departments prepare reports explaining why the process needs further preparation. The Institute for Apprenticeships and Technical Education sets the standards for much of this, and has so far not set one for the stage before the stage.
Under the latest proposals, a young person might spend a year on a pre-apprenticeship before becoming eligible for an apprenticeship, then spend several more years gaining qualifications, only to discover that the employer has moved production abroad. The government could then offer a retraining course. By the time the applicant finally finds a job the retirement age may have arrived, allowing officials to celebrate another successful transition from education into economic inactivity.
The practical alternative would be to persuade employers to train inexperienced workers in exchange for their labour. That approach, however, risks resembling an apprenticeship, and Britain has already established that the apprenticeship system needs another programme.
Five Humorous Observations
- A pre-apprenticeship. So that’s training for the training for the job. We’re two levels below the thing and I haven’t even had a sandwich.
- Every job wants three years’ experience. For an entry-level job. So where did the first guy get his experience, a time machine? Was he born in hi-vis?
- They told one girl she was overqualified, and then not ready. Same company. That’s not a rejection, that’s a bad breakup. It’s not you, it’s also you.
- Competitive salary. Competitive with what? A sloth? I’ve seen the salary and it’s competing, and it’s losing.
- Upload your CV, then type everything on the CV into the little boxes. I’ve now sent you the same document twice and I’m still the one in trouble.
Satire: this is British satire based on the reporting linked above. The applicant, the modules and the quotes are invented, and none of them needed a pre-apprenticeship to get made up. Anyone wondering what prat means may proceed directly, with no preparatory course required.
Staff Writer at The London Prat
