The state government is planning to start a trial of school-based and part-time apprenticeships next month in partnership with two group training providers.
The state government is planning to start a trial of school-based and part-time apprenticeships next month in partnership with two group training providers.
This marks another step in the government’s plans to reform the apprenticeship and training systems, as it seeks to address Western Australia’s acute skills shortage.
Education and Training Minister Ljiljanna Ravlich has also confirmed the government will introduce amendments to the Industrial Training Act to underpin the wider use of school-based apprenticeships in 2007.
The latest changes are in line with a national reform plan agreed by state and federal ministers earlier this year and follow business calls for faster reform of the apprentice system.
Ms Ravlich believes WA is leading the nation, particularly in regard to reducing the duration of traditional apprenticeships from four years to either two or three years.
“The reforms we have managed to introduce are just light years ahead of the other states,” she told WA Business News.
Hospitality Group Training and South Metropolitan Youth Link will run school-based apprenticeships in the hospitality, metals and automotive sectors, while HGT will run the part-time apprenticeships.
These measures follow the introduction two years ago of School Apprenticeship Link, a scheme designed to introduce school students to a range of trade opportunities.
HGT general manager Iain McDougall has welcomed the changes, which he has been advocating for five years. He believes part-time apprenticeships, which will run for up to four years at 25 hours per week, will open up training to a wider pool of people, including mature-aged workers and single parents.
Mr McDougall said that, despite strong demand for trained workers, his group had more than 60 unfilled apprenticeship places.
Hence, like many business people, he would like to see even more changes.
“There is a screaming demand from industry for flexibility and changes to the system,” Mr McDougall told the Skilling Western Australia conference last week.
He would like to see more flexibility and choice in training delivery, including a move away from classroom-based training to more on-the-job training.
Mr McDougall said options such as one-to-one workplace-based tuition would open up the possibility of faster training.
Looking ahead, he said “the sleeping giant of the skills shortage” was the trend for young workers to be given extra responsibilities, such as staff supervision, for which they had no training or experience.
The hospitality industry needed to address this issue by providing more post-trade training and management training.
Another speaker at the skilling conference, WA Skills Training managing director Bob Butson, said the changes being introduced to apprenticeships and traineeships only addressed part of the problem.
He said there were skills shortages in many other areas, such as process technicians and mining workers, that were not covered by traditional apprenticeships.
Mr Butson called for more funding and flexibility for private training providers that were able to respond to the needs of industry.
