Editorial | Apprenticeship and literacy

This newspaper applauds the Government’s plan to “revamp and redo” Jamaica’s hodge-podge apprenticeship programme.

But the new scheme – a fact that is no doubt fully appreciated by the people involved in this exercise – must be part of a broader overhaul of the island’s education system, aimed at producing people capable of operating in 21st-century economies. Which is why this newspaper looks forward to further and better particulars on the project, including information on where it sits in the framework of the Patterson Commission’s report on the transformation of Jamaica’s education sector. Among its wide range of proposals, the commission made several recommendations for advancing technical and vocational education and training in Jamaica, of which apprenticeship schemes are critical components.

Although the report is nearly two years old and the Government has named a committee to oversee its implementation, the basis of analyses and recommendations – most of which this newspaper supports – have not as yet been subject to a robust, government-led public review. There is no general understanding of the commission’s arguments, or of what is being implemented and why.

In that regard, even though having a vibrant apprenticeship programme is, on the face of it, an eminently sensible idea, Dr Dana Morris Dixon should subject her plans to full scrutiny and serious debate to ensure full buy-in and the best outcomes.

Indeed, there is no need to reinvent the wheel, for as Dr Morris Dixon said: “In every other part of the world where skills training has done well, apprenticeship is a key element of it ... .” Implicit in that is that there are templates that Jamaica can adjust to fit its own circumstances.

But at the same time, Dr Morris Dixon and others involved in this project have to be wary of those who might attempt to conflate any focus on technical and vocation training with a lack of need for sound, underlying education, and a misconstruing of the minister’s comment that “not everybody is going to want to go do the classroom thing”.

SKILLS SHORTAGE

There is good reason for an increased concentration in Jamaica on technical and vocational training and education, underpinned by a robust apprenticeship system. Indeed, as Dr Morris Dixon noted, not all students are minded to enter the kind of professions where the emphasis is on classroom learning and a pedagogy heavy on theory. Some students learn best in other environments. And in any event, the trend in the global economy is towards requiring technical skills, which are in short supply globally. Indeed, some reports suggest that three-quarters of employers globally now have difficulty in finding skills in the balance they need, while, according to the World Economic Forum, businesses predict that over the next half a decade, the fast pace of technology will disrupt the core skills of over four in 10 workers. “Technology is moving faster than companies can design and scale up their training programmes,” the report says.

In Jamaica, this problem of skills shortage is even more acute. Over six in 10 of the island’s workers have no professional vocational certification. Neither have they been part of any formal skills training programmes, whether on the job or via apprenticeship schemes.

Two things are substantially responsible for this.

One is the island’s dysfunctional education system. Each year, up to 40 per cent of the island’s students, after five years in primary school, enter high school ill-prepared to absorb secondary education. They read, write and do sums below their age and grade levels. For a significant portion, the deficit is chronic, requiring major interventions.

The problem continues in high school, where the majority of students leave without certificates and less than 30 per cent of those who do the tests pass five Caribbean Secondary Education Certificate subjects, including maths and English, in a single sitting. The upshot is that large groups of students leave high school as ‘graduates’ but are unable to matriculate to higher or other forms of tertiary education, even programmes designed to address precisely this situation.

FUNDAMENTAL FIX

Second, as Prime Minister Andrew Holness lamented in January at the start of construction of a ship repair yard in Kingston, the island’s old system of apprenticeship (notwithstanding the existence of a handful of initiatives) has all but collapsed. Clearly, this project is part of the Government’s strategy to revive and modernise the system, which is now largely the remit of the Government’s training agency, the HEART/NSTA Trust.

The Patterson Commission report made several recommendations for enhancing the island’s TVET and apprenticeship arrangements, including a proposal for certifying skilled but informally trained technicians, and aligning training with private-sector needs.

We agree entirely with the report’s thrust in this area. However, there can be no sustainable TVET and apprenticeship system for a modern environment without a broader and fundamental fix of Jamaica’s education crisis.

People working in modern industries, whether in offices or on factory floors, are, as the Davos report suggested, increasingly engaged in highly technical work where problem-solving skills are in demand. They have to be able to read and write, add and subtract, and to manipulate data and other forms of information.

A third of students, therefore, should not be allowed to leave primary school illiterate. Which is something that Germany, the country with the world’s best-developed apprenticeship system, understands. So does Dr Morris Dixon.