UK: Apprenticeships are "failing young people", says Poverty Commission
18 replies, posted
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[QUOTE]The government's apprenticeships drive is failing to deliver for young people in England - with enrolments flatlining among under-25s, a commission says. The Social Mobility and Child Poverty Commission says apprenticeship starts for under-25s rose by 4% from 2010-14 , compared with 17% for over-25s. And most training courses taken were not a step up from the apprentice's previous level of study, it added.
But the report said: "The overall growth in apprenticeship starts has been driven by large increases in participation by over-25s. "While youth apprenticeships have roughly flatlined since the early years of the decade, starts by over 25s are over 150,000 higher in 2014/15 compared to 2009/10. "In comparison to this increase there were over 5,000 fewer apprenticeship starts by under-19s in 2014/15 compared to 2010/11. "And there were around 1,000 fewer 19-24 apprenticeship starts in 2014/15 compared to 2011/12." If this was projected forward, then adult apprenticeship starts would continue to increase, while youth starts would stagnate or decline, it added. The commission also highlighted how the vast majority of apprentices were studying at levels below their age.[/QUOTE]
Sources:
[URL="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-35847191"]BBC NEWS[/URL]
[URL="http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/government-drive-to-get-more-young-people-into-apprenticeships-failing-to-deliver-for-under-24s-says-a6943226.html"]The Independent[/URL]
[URL="https://www.gov.uk/government/news/too-many-apprenticeships-not-meeting-the-needs-of-young-people-employers-or-the-economy"]GOV.UK[/URL]
What do you expect when you allow companies to offer normal jobs as apprenticeships just so they can pay a third of the hourly cost.
Retail Assistant in Tescos isn't a fucking apprenticeship.
If the market for Apprentice's is flooded with retail jobs, teenagers are going to be dissuaded from looking at proper Apprentice Positions.
It's like a real job. Just paid less. And once you finish you might be let go so they can find another apprentice. And it means they can let full pay employees go to replace with lower paid workers.
But it's also lower quality worker, unexperienced etc..
[QUOTE=mdeceiver79;49976544]It's like a real job. Just paid less. And once you finish you might be let go so they can find another apprentice. And it means they can let full pay employees go to replace with lower paid workers.[/QUOTE]
Finland has the same problem but even worse. The government forces the jobless to take up these "job experiences" that pay 9 euros [I]per day[/I], and refusal will cause a loss of all benefits.
So a shit-ton of companies are using these "job experience" slave workers as their main force, doing exactly the same jobs but paying pennies, while the real workers are thrown out. And once the "job experience" ends, they just take new ones in.
Some companies have even kicked out their real employees only to take them back in as "job experience". Might as well, since it costs them basically nothing and it's not illegal. The situation of jobless people in Finland is absolute horror.
[QUOTE=Orkel;49976575]Finland has the same problem but even worse. The government forces the jobless to take up these "job experiences" that pay 9 euros [I]per day[/I], and refusal will cause a loss of all benefits.
So a shit-ton of companies are using these "job experience" slave workers as their main force, doing exactly the same jobs but paying pennies, while the real workers are thrown out. And once the "job experience" ends, they just take new ones in.
Some companies have even kicked out their real employees only to take them back in as "job experience". Might as well, since it costs them basically nothing and it's not illegal. The situation of jobless people in Finland is absolute horror.[/QUOTE]
That's disgusting.
[QUOTE=Orkel;49976575]Finland has the same problem but even worse. The government forces the jobless to take up these "job experiences" that pay 9 euros [I]per day[/I], and refusal will cause a loss of all benefits.
So a shit-ton of companies are using these "job experience" slave workers as their main force, doing exactly the same jobs but paying pennies, while the real workers are thrown out. And once the "job experience" ends, they just take new ones in.
Some companies have even kicked out their real employees only to take them back in as "job experience". Might as well, since it costs them basically nothing and it's not illegal. The situation of jobless people in Finland is absolute horror.[/QUOTE]
That happens here too if you go on jobseeker's allowance (previously the unemployment benefit) - If you can't get a paid job you're forced to go work for your very meagre allowance, and the companies release you by the point they should give you a job and just wait for the next person who will work for them at no cost to themselves.
These systems are eminently stacked in favour of the companies.
[QUOTE=Orkel;49976575]Finland has the same problem but even worse. The government forces the jobless to take up these "job experiences" that pay 9 euros [I]per day[/I], and refusal will cause a loss of all benefits.
So a shit-ton of companies are using these "job experience" slave workers as their main force, doing exactly the same jobs but paying pennies, while the real workers are thrown out. And once the "job experience" ends, they just take new ones in.
Some companies have even kicked out their real employees only to take them back in as "job experience". Might as well, since it costs them basically nothing and it's not illegal. The situation of jobless people in Finland is absolute horror.[/QUOTE]
Same as in the UK. Though actual work experience is unpaid in most circumstances. They tried to make my bro do unpaid shelf stacking work, he refused and lost job seeker allowance. I did 3 months of unpaid web developer stuff through the system - I managed to get a proper job elsewhere after those 3 months. I later found out the place I did unpaid work for - 3 out of the 6 employees were there doing unpaid "experience".
People on job seekers are coerced and bullied into stopping claiming. My job centre was about 30 mins away, just to be difficult they would occasionally tell me to go to a different one which was 2 hours away. So glad I'm out of that misery. Its win win to them either you get a low paid/unpaid job or you stop claiming, in both scenarios they can claim you are no longer employed.
Absolute nightmare.
The apprenticeship system does has some decent jobs. But how you are treated is really up to the employer. If they just want to have an Apprenticeship course run 12 months then they aren't forced to pay you anymore than £3.30 an hour.
Working 44 hours a week for £145 is pretty shit. Some employers will pay more though. I have a friend who's currently doing an apprenticeship with a fairly small company, they pay him £5 an hour since he does a decent job. Still less than min wage (£6.70 for under 25s) though.
Apprenticeships are crap.
I did one to get my current job.
Just to get the job.
Was worth it, but fucking hell is it a crap process to do.
So, is this like Internships, but can be applied to anything for free labor?
[QUOTE=gufu;49977218]So, is this like Internships, but can be applied to anything for free labor?[/QUOTE]Free or vastly underpaid labor, yes.
Yeah of course they do. I have two qualifications that have literally gotten me nowhere.
No kidding. I know of a very previously highly-rated apprenticeship in my area where the recruitment documentation promised '£11000 in the first year', but then told them that for their pre-first-year, they would spend a year at the college of the company's choice getting zero pay, wearing a uniform and having semi-controlled 'working hours' but [i]still no pay[/i]. Talk about sliding goalposts. The apprenticeship system has zero oversight and allows huge companies to fuck people in ways they don't even need to.
I'm a 17 year old doing a 14 month apprenticeship at an IT company based just outside London.
At first I understood why I wasn't being paid as much money, I didn't know much. But now 10 months down the line, I've received one pay rise, that was of about £100 a month because I said that travel was too expensive (£55 a week) .I get paid £800 a month before tax, national insurance etc. I do pretty much the same job as everyone, send the same amount of emails and on the phone for just as long, if not longer.
The recruitment agency just didn't acknowledge I excited until 8 months in when they finally gave me some work to do. This was only because we got another apprentice as well.
Basically I'm cheap labour and they don't care, both my workplace and my recruitment agency.
My last apprenticeship was false advertising and I was only there for two weeks.
Oh and I work 9-6, usually staying until 7:30 to get work done. Although this is illegal because of my age. And because the other apprentice is 18 he earns more than me because of the minimum wage. Even though I've been here 9 months longer than him.
A large amount of apprenticeships are just an excuse for paying less than half minimum wage for the same amount of work you'd get from a normal person. I know they have no experience etc etc, but realistically most jobs that don't require very specific skills/training can be done the same if not better by fresh 16-18 year olds than people who have been there forever.
I got onto a pretty good apprenticeship years ago in business software for a huge company - The starting pay was actually really good and I rose fast (Starting on 17k going up to 24k after a year and a bit), the issue I had was that they took graduates on even with completely unrelated qualifications, starting them at 30k doing the exact same work as apprentices (And many were of the opinion that the apprentices outperformed grads as a whole), and they didn't even expect apprentices to be on 30k after 5 years work while they did a degree alongside work.
That isn't even factoring in that its very frustrating working with people who you work far harder than and completely eclipse in terms of how well you actually do your job, but they are fine to barely hit the bar because they are already being paid 40-50k a year and you are doing all the work for them.
[QUOTE=Ultradar;49977479]I'm a 17 year old doing a 14 month apprenticeship at an IT company based just outside London.
At first I understood why I wasn't being paid as much money, I didn't know much. But now 10 months down the line, I've received one pay rise, that was of about £100 a month because I said that travel was too expensive (£55 a week) .I get paid £800 a month before tax, national insurance etc. I do pretty much the same job as everyone, send the same amount of emails and on the phone for just as long, if not longer.
The recruitment agency just didn't acknowledge I excited until 8 months in when they finally gave me some work to do. This was only because we got another apprentice as well.
Basically I'm cheap labour and they don't care, both my workplace and my recruitment agency.
My last apprenticeship was false advertising and I was only there for two weeks.
Oh and I work 9-6, usually staying until 7:30 to get work done. Although this is illegal because of my age. And because the other apprentice is 18 he earns more than me because of the minimum wage. Even though I've been here 9 months longer than him.[/QUOTE]
You should look up companies like Capgemini and Accenture in terms of IT apprenticeships - They offer an acceptable starting wage that you can live on by yourself as well as an assload of training/qualifications paid for by them, as well as a guaranteed position after as long as you don't break the rules. They seem very strict in terms of recruiting (300ish applicants per spot they have each intake), but if you are super enthusiastic about IT, have previous experience as well as personal experience even doing basic programming and stuff it puts you above 95% of the other candidates.
I'm glad we got a pretty solid apprenticeship program in Norway.
We're more protected than the average worker.
Our pay is regulated by law to be 1 years pay over the 2 or 1 1/2 years of apprenticeship, and part of our salaries are paid to the company by the government.
If we work without supervision our pay grade is different.
There are a few good apprenticeships out there but the vast majority of them are used to take the piss. Had a friend of mine who went on one to be an HGV mechanic, they basically had him cleaning up 90% of the time and then they dumped him after a few months when they decided they didn't want to pay him anymore. He found a good one after that but it's moronic how some businesses use it - a lot of companies are using it as an excuse to pay people below minimum wage for hours of labour without teaching them anything. Conservative government has only made this worse.
Apprenticeships are throwing a dart at the board with a blindfold, you may get lucky but I couldn't.
Apparently a college education won't get me anywhere with any company, tried a few times but most don't hire probably because of my age, meaning they'd have to pay me more than they would someone who is younger, who they could get by paying the lowest wage.
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