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.

Labradora

Calendargirl

In theory, it sounds good.

We need to teach youngsters how to earn a living, often in practical subjects.

Sounds like technical colleges, back in the 60’s.

Indeed.
Didn't we have Apprenticeships and Technical Colleges in the old days ?
Equal respect for non-academic qualifications should always have been there.
Not everyone can be academic in their "work" sphere. The country needs plumbers, electricians, builders, gas specialists, gardeners.
More enlightened cultures not only respect both pathways but also acknowledge that your electrician may well be intellectually smart and just as interested in and appreciative of cultural matters as the more " academic" members of society.

Spot on!
The damage done by the Blair years in turning perfectly good Colleges and Polytechnics into second rate Universities is incalculable.
Hopefully Andy Burnham will start us on the road to being sensible again regarding the trades and education.

When I said 'Chartered Engineer the person behind the counter, looked at me anxiously and said 'Does that mean he works in a garage?'

This sums up the mindset that our rigid education system fosters! What is wrong with working in a garage!? Why might that be lower down the scale than a chartered engineer!?

I am behind AB on this one. Except perhaps the local emphasis. Young people need qualification so they can spread their wings if they wish. But the local element of a good starting point for cleaning ideas and for work placements.

But the local element is a good starting point for gleaning ideas ....
Blooming spellchecker!

All we now have to hope is that the media do not hound him out before he's had a chance to unpack his suitcase.

A new tax on income to fund social care is among the plans drawn up by officials for Andy Burnham to consider in his first weeks in office.

Civil servants have developed proposals that would require workers to make mandatory contributions to a new privately managed fund to pay for their care in later life.

The plans, drawn up by officials in the Department for Health and Social Care (DHSC), could fund a new care system costing £18bn a year.

One end of the life spectrum to the other. He’s going to be busy and I wish him well. Tackling these issues is long overdue.

It sounds from posts here and radio phone ins,that most people want Andy Burnham’s government to succeed. ,
We want a more positive,constructive approach with long term aims identified.

We need good apprenticeships. We have three men in our family who chose apprenticeships over university. All well qualified, making good income and our youngest at 28 with his partner, just bought their first house. The added benefit is in a family with few practical people,we now have people with expertise 🌞

It's good to see the posts demonstrating a will for AB's government to succeed with these complex, long term plans. If thats a sign that some of the electorate at least ( and may grow 🤞) is willing to support long term goals that Britain badly needs. It won't be easy but I hope the government does succeed.

Your three men Iam64 have done well- and you are surrounded by readily available practical expertise - I am jealous 😊

I've always kept an interested eye on education promises and intentions. I am definitely demonstrating a will for these new proposals to succeed.

However, (and this is my main reason for criticising KS and Rachel Reeves), as a payer of an additional 20% VAT on school fees x 2, it was promised to families by KS that the extra revenue would go directly to state school improvements, with an additional 6,500 teachers. There's actually now fewer teachers than before, so we must believe we were misled. Promise broken.

I can try to put that disappointment behind me because I feel a new, more optimistic, person might now be in charge and might now deliver what the country needs, but it's also quite natural to feel some apprehension.

My two grandsons have taken very different paths.

One took the graduate route and now works as a computer engineer and software systems for the MOD through his company’s contract.

The other grandson works for the same company and is in the first year of a 3 year (it maybe longer) apprenticeship.

Both extremely happy in their choices.

A spanner in the works might be the ever changing face of industry and commerce, where local businesses close and new ones open, and where AI will play a part of course.

Youngsters need to be prepared to get on their bikes and move to where the work is, something that mankind has always done.

The young do need support though.

The way it works in Manchester as far as I understand is that the young are provided with clear pathways to their chosen careers to follow. Work experience will be commonplace.

My daughter benefited enormously from work experience (she is 55 now). She spent time at Smith Klein - once she got her A levels they contacted her and offered her a job, but also paid for her to get her degree and subsequent PhD.

My son worked with various Rangers and environment and eventually graduated (via a circuitous route geology degree) as an environmental scientist.

Yes, both graduates, but they could easily have remained in the different industries without degrees.