John MacDonald: An apprenticeship is anything but second-best

I always have and always will be a huge fan of on-the-job training. Which is why I think it’s brilliant that we’ve got an education expert saying today that the apprenticeship system needs an overhaul.   And not only that, he wants to see schools doing more, and is suggesting they could offer a trades preparation qualification to create a pipeline of new apprentices - but also to remove the stigma that an apprenticeship is second fiddle to a university degree.    Michael Johnston from the NZ Initiative think-tank says in Germany, 50% of school-leavers end up in working in the trades. But here in New Zealand, a university education is given much higher status than apprenticeship training.   He says we need a more coherent apprenticeship system connecting schools, the trades and the training organisations.    Michael Johnston is saying that part of the problem is that trades historically have been seen or have been promoted as the thing kids do if they’re not bright enough to go to university or not interested in going to university.   Which is crazy for a number of reasons – for starters, I marvel all the time at what tradespeople know and what they can do.   He says maybe we also need some sort of bonding system that would keep require tradespeople once they’ve finished their apprenticeship to stick around and not bugger off somewhere else.    He says that would probably encourage more employers to take someone on in the first place. He might have a point there, but I suspect that businesses look at apprentices and just see extra work.   I don't think they’re necessarily concerned whether the apprentice is going to stick around once they’ve got their qualification.   But the idea of his that I really like, is this bit where he says schools need to up their game when it comes to promoting trades and getting kids ready to move into a trade.   Because I think, over the years, schools —but, in particular, school careers advisors— have pointed kids in the wrong direction, making them think that a university degree is the be-all and end-all.   Another reason why I’m so excited at the ideas Michael Johnston is pushing today, is that on-the-job training is how I started my working life. So maybe I’m biased.   I wanted to be a journalist, so I did a cadetship at the local newspaper.   And, since then, I have been dismayed at how so many people have been sucked in by this idea that a university degree is way better than an apprenticeship or any other form of on-the-job training.   Of course, there are some professions where people have to go to university – law, medicine, engineering are examples.   But I have never understood why a degree makes someone a better journalist, for example.   The other great thing about apprenticeships is that someone can start one, realise they're not actually cut out for that particular trade, and move on to something else without racking up huge debt and then, after three or four years, realising they’re not cut out for the career they studied for.   A guy I went to school with took on a plumbing apprenticeship when he left. Realised pretty quickly it wasn’t him, then moved an electrical apprenticeship and flourished.   The other thing about all of this is that it seems we’ve been saying forever that we need more apprenticeships, and we need to take the trades more seriously, but nothing seems to have changed.   Maybe it’s because —if we’re really honest— we’ve been so brainwashed over the years and still believe that that you only do a trade if you’re not bright enough to go to university.   Hopefully, there aren’t any careers advisors who still hold on to that view. Because I agree completely that the apprenticeship system needs an overhaul and the stigma that an apprenticeship is second-best to a university degree needs to go.  See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.