Enlarge image
Prospective plant mechanics for electrical, measuring, control and regulation technology in the education and technology center of the Chamber of Crafts in Leipzig
Photo: Waltraud Grubitzsch / picture alliance / dpa
If high school graduates decide to do an apprenticeship after leaving school, they rarely choose an apprenticeship in a craft business.
This is shown by a current survey of the skilled trades in the Ruhr area by the Regionalverband Ruhr (RVR).
For the study, the RVR teamed up with Handwerk Region Ruhr, the merger of the Ruhr area chambers in Dortmund, Düsseldorf and Münster, as well as with ten district craft associations, and evaluated almost 100,000 training contracts that were concluded between 2011 and 2021.
The result: In the region there is a tendency towards higher school degrees.
Although more and more young people are taking their Abitur, handicraft businesses mostly concluded contracts with trainees who had an intermediate qualification.
According to this, 39.6 percent of the trainees have a high school diploma and 36.8 percent a high school diploma.
High school graduates are more likely to opt for a course of study or non-technical training.
Commercial apprenticeships have regularly been among the most popular apprenticeships for years.
Together with the falling number of young people with secondary school qualifications, this is increasing the shortage of skilled workers in the trades: During the period under study, companies were finding it increasingly difficult to find replacements for employees who were retiring or changing careers.
In the 2021/2022 training year, almost 60,000 apprenticeship positions remained vacant in North Rhine-Westphalia - a new negative record.
Another current study recently showed that more and more high school graduates are opting for an apprenticeship after leaving school.
In the past ten years, the proportion of those who start dual or school-based training with their Abitur has increased from 35 percent in 2011 to 47.4 percent in 2021.
That was the result of the "training monitor" that the Research Institute for Educational and Social Economics (FiBS) had created on behalf of the Bertelsmann Foundation.
"There can be no question of a lack of attractiveness of vocational training for high school graduates," said Dieter Dohmen, FiBS director and author of the study, at the time, "nor of the fact that high school graduates were not interested enough in vocational training .« In the meantime, almost half of the school-leaving year are aiming for vocational training.
Women are also underrepresented
But whether the trade really benefits from it remains to be seen.
In order to make manual training more attractive, career changers should also be addressed more intensively.
There are already special advisory services at universities, said Philipp Kaczmarek, spokesman for the Dortmund Chamber of Crafts.
Another model for countering the shortage of skilled workers is part-time training.
"This is particularly interesting for returnees from parental leave," said Kaczmarek.
Part-time training is not yet widespread.
But she should be more normal.
According to the survey, in addition to high school graduates, women are also underrepresented in manual training.
According to this, every fifth position is occupied by a trainee.
While manual and technical job descriptions are the most popular among men, it is primarily professions in service, consulting and sales that are preferred by women.
At the top is the training as a specialist saleswoman in the food trade, where women make up around 87.9 percent of the trainees, followed by hairdressers (79.7%) and confectioners (73.9%).
asr/dpa
