Burnham to tell schools in England to adapt teaching to local business needs- what do you think?

When Himself started his 5 year apprenticeship as a machine tool fitter, donkeys years ago, his parents didn't get offered money. Hex earned just shy of a tenner a week in 1971 and tipped up half to his mum ‘for keep’.

Why should parents get any money now? What is the matter with these government people? Have they lost the plot?

I can only answer my own question.
Perhaps this cohort of apprentices don’t get paid? 🤷‍♀️

Are they still ‘in school’?
Even so …. I don’t get it.

The funding is up to £4,500 annually per household to offset lost Child Benefit and Universal Credit elements. The amount of grant a young person on an apprenticeship receives means that families on benefits can be considerably worse off than whilst their child was in school.

Back in the day didn't firms pay to train their employees? Apprentices received a wage?
Now we need to do their job for them.

Speaking from an employers view, we advertise, few applicants, most unsuitable and not willing to work the hours required, or the training courses.

A big part of this is transport and loss of benefits.

They still pay, through a levy. New scheme explained here.
find-employer-schemes.education.gov.uk/interim/growth-and-skills-levy

GrannyGravy13

Speaking from an employers view, we advertise, few applicants, most unsuitable and not willing to work the hours required, or the training courses.

A big part of this is transport and loss of benefits.

It’s a very different world than we we were the age for apprenticeships . Boys of 15 or 16 obtained five year apprenticeships. These were proper apprenticeships leading to qualifications and enabling young people to grow up in a structured work environment and expect to eventually be well qualified for their area of work

I’m pleased the govt is attempting to reintroduce proper apprenticeships. I remember YTS schemes, offering very poor training that led no where

Casdon

They still pay, through a levy. New scheme explained here.
find-employer-schemes.education.gov.uk/interim/growth-and-skills-levy

Having jumped through various government hoops, in theory it is easy, in practice not so.

I really hope AB’s initiative is easier, more attractive to young people and most importantly works for them and employers.

I want the scheme to work, I would like to see AB succeed, if he succeeds it follows that the UK will.

FriedGreenTomatoes2

And their parents, if on benefits, will be given an extra £4,500 if their child takes up a place.

I’m not sure this has been properly thought out to be honest.

The £4500 is precisely because it has been thought through

I can imagine the bureaucracy attached to the scheme is a nightmare GrannyGravy13, and I think it will take some time before the young people going into apprenticeships have learned through their education what is expected of them, it’s chicken and egg. I agree that it is in the country’s interests that this succeeds.

When I first went to secondary school ( 60 years ago in a rural area) in the first year of comprehensive schooling ( 11+ stopped for us the year before) the school we were allocated was a former secondary modern. The school had a work skills unit ( bricklaying, plumbing, metalwork carpentry gardening, various farm skills and a decent domestic science and dressmaking unit and sports fields. The older children ( pre comprehensive ed) were able to specialise from about age 14. As first year students we were taught domestic science and needlework then walked over to the former grammar school for language labs to learn French and chemistry. The grammar school building became the sixth form unit.
These new plans sound very similar if updated for today’s skill needs! So very sensible. We are all different and are suited to different paths.

Nothing is new, is it ?
I remember being told by a teacher about The Tripartite System.

www.tutor2u.net/sociology/topics/tripartite-system?srsltid=AfmBOoqDQl6_pl9AcJN_k1aFRZEXrWYwyH0gABNzg0u448hy-rT-Egk2

I'm one of them.

I "failed" the 11 plus and went to a Technical High School in 1962. It was a new build school and the headteacher a former inspector who wanted to make it work. Lots of energetic young teachers.

So there was a good technical and practical side. One thing that would be different now is that girls did sewing cooking and some girls secretarial work. Boys did woodwork carpentry and technical drawing.

(There was an academic stream for those who had clearly "just missed" the grammar school so boys and girls went into that stream at either 14 or 16. And we also took young people from the secondary modern on the same site at 16 as we had a 6th form.)

I loved it, there was also lots of music and art and clubs and so on and even dance drama classes. Two languages for the more academic stream

I was far more happy than I would have been at the grammar school.

But no Latin or proper English Lit which I would have benefitted from. You can't have it all and I was one who did go to university. We also, amazingly, took the Messiah with our choir to the Town Hall.

I feel so fortunate compared with today having had this.

Now I know people, like my tree surgeons, and a picture framer, who all have university degrees or run an alternative bike co op.

and are far, far happier and content than being in a pressured and high stress profession.

Its not just a matter of how academically bright a child is, it's whether they have the sort of character that does well in this or that job

FriedGreenTomatoes2

And their parents, if on benefits, will be given an extra £4,500 if their child takes up a place.

I’m not sure this has been properly thought out to be honest.

‘Up to’ FGT it starts at £17 pw.