Apprenticeship: one concept, many facets

Citation

Smith, E. (2016), "Apprenticeship: one concept, many facets", Education + Training, Vol. 58 No. 6. https://doi.org/10.1108/ET-05-2016-0083

Apprenticeship: one concept, many facets

Article Type: Guest editorial From: Education + Training, Volume 58, Issue 6.

This special edition is based on papers delivered at a conference of the International Network on Innovative Apprenticeship (INAP), a network of researchers and practitioners interested in apprenticeship and related issues. A previous special edition of Education + Training, “Innovative apprenticeships: promoting successful school-to-work transitions”, was based on the third conference of the network, held in Turin, Italy, in September 2009. This special edition is based on the sixth conference, held in Ballarat, Australia, in September 2015. The theme of the conference was Architectures for Apprenticeship: Achieving Economic and Social Goals. The papers in this volume are selected from the best of the 34 full papers and keynote speeches presented.

Since that first special edition in 2009, the Global Financial Crisis has prompted many countries to consider apprenticeship as a means of preventing and ameliorating youth unemployment, and yet apprenticeship has distinct economic and pedagogical goals as well as social goals. Participants in the conference had a particular interest in policy, with the largest single number of papers appearing in the policy stream. For the special issue, however, we selected papers which represented a wide range of aspects of apprenticeship.

The paper by Thomas Deissinger and Philipp Gonon provides an up-to-date insight into the “dual system” countries of Germany and Switzerland, often regarded as models for other countries to emulate in developing their apprenticeship systems. Deissinger and Gonon point out some current stresses and strains on the system, among which is the need to re-convince both companies and young people of the worth of the apprenticeship system. The paper examines the role of stakeholders in addressing this issue, with particular reference to the recent phenomenon whereby more young people are participating in higher education or full-time vocational training, than in apprenticeships, a challenge to these countries where apprenticeship was formerly seen as a “normal” route for school-leavers. Stakeholders’ views are also examined in the paper by Linda Simon and Kira Clarke in the Australian context. In this paper the focus is the perennial issue of encouraging young women to engage in traditional apprenticeships, which have always been dominated by men, except for a few occupations such as hairdressing.

Apprenticeships are also of immense value to individual employers, and the paper by Devlin Hanson and Bob Lerman examines this issue from the point of view of a very large employer in the USA: the military. All three military services in the USA offer apprenticeships, covering over 100 occupations. The paper identifies some of the benefits of the programme and also the challenges faced in aligning the military apprenticeship system with the civilian system. As the apprenticeship system in the USA has a very low participation compared with many other countries, this is a very important paper, with implications beyond the military.

Two papers focus on learning in apprenticeship. Stephen Billett’s paper reminds us that apprenticeship as a method of learning has a very long history and that a focus on government structures and qualifications, i.e. positioning apprenticeship as a form of education, may obscure this history. He stresses the importance of workplaces in helping to shape and facilitate apprentices’ learning. Magnus Fjellström and Per Kristmansson provide some fine-grained empirical research that examines the relationships between the workplace and the educational provider in two different industry areas. Their paper emphasises, like Billett’s, the importance of the workplace experience and activities in the learning of apprentices.

In apprenticeship, the teachers and trainers are vitally important. But who are these people? In many countries, college-based teachers of apprentices come to this occupation comparatively late in their careers, having had successful careers in the occupations for which they are now training people. Bonnie Watt’s paper provides a fascinating insight into Canadian tradespeople who have elected to become vocational teachers, in preparation for which they are required to undertake full-time university studies in pedagogy. The doubts and fears that they overcome on their way to becoming vocational teachers reflect the determination and passion of those choosing to pass on their knowledge in this way. They also reflect the way in which occupations serviced by the vocational education and training system are still undervalued in many societies, evidenced in the way in which these “second-career” teachers talk about how they feel as “blue-collar” workers moving into a “white-collar” space.

I would like to thank the authors, from six countries, who completed their writing and revising tasks with promptness and courtesy, under great time pressure. The team of reviewers is also thanked; the reviewers also willingly worked to very tight timelines.

I would also like to thank the Chair of the INAP network, Professor Philipp Gonon from the University of Zurich who presided over the conference in Ballarat, and the Australian Department of Education and Training which sponsored the conference, which was opened by the Minister for Vocational Education and Training, Senator Simon Birmingham. I am grateful for the assistance of Simone Bartrum who undertook much of the administrative work in preparing the conference proceedings from which volume these papers were selected for further development; and of Briony Cleveland, who not only helped to run the conference but also provided support for this special edition.

Finally I would like to thank Martin McCracken, the Editor of Education + Training, for his advice on the preparation of this special edition.

Erica Smith - School of Education, Federation University Australia, Ballarat, Australia