A REDUCTION?

Evening Post, Volume CXXV, Issue 150, 28 June 1938, Page 12

A REDUCTION?

APPRENTICES' HOURS

THE TECHNICAL COLLEGE

DIRECTOR'S REPORT The question as to whether or not the attendance of carpentery and joinery apprentices at trade classes at the Wellington Technical College should be reduced to two nights a week was discussed at the meeting of the Technical College Board of Governors last night. A letter was received from Mr. P. H. Kinsman, district registrar of apprentices, as follows: — "At a meeting of the Wellington Carpenters' and Joiners' Apprenticeship Committee held on June 13, it was- considered that as apprentices were reluctant to have so much of the week taken up in technical instruction, attendances should be limited to two nights a week in lieu of three as at' present. By so doing, it was thought that a greater interest would be fostered and added encouragement given for military training to be taken up." In his report to the board, Mr. R. G. Ridling, the Director, stated:—"Most apprenticeship orders today require an apprentice to attend a technical college or school or other approved institution during three years of his apprenticeship or until he shall obtain a certificate. The course laid down for most students in our own college occupies three evenings per week. Each school year averages 31 weeks and the average attendance over the whole of the institution approximates 75 per cent. Thus the average attendance of an apprentice over the compulsory period of his training in a technical college approximates 388 hours or less than 10 working weeks. DIFFICULTY OF TRAINING. "Few employers today would assert that they are able to give a complete and satisfactory training to apprentices. It is on this account that the Technical College with its facilities for providing that training is being used and yet the amount of time in which it is expected to provide a course of training accessory to practical work taken in the factory is on the average one-twenty-fifth of the time given to the factory training. In only a few trades is attendance necessary throughout the period of apprenticeship and this applies to those trades which have a bearing upon the health or life of the people. "Regularly there arises a demand from apprentices that the amount of time given to training in the Technical College shall be reduced and some apprenticeship committees are sympathetic to these requests on the ground that the lads should have a greater amount of free time in each week. They point out, perhaps justifiably, that a lad who spends three evenings at school and one evening in military training (where a lad is interested in this), there is little time left over for leisure and relaxation. I might add to these activities one factor which does interfere with the regularity of attendance and that is games. Apprentices, like other young people, attend on one, sometimes on two evenings in each week for training in games with the various clubs to which they belong. There is, therefore, little time for other activities. "Because of this the demand for a reduction in training which has a very definite bearing upon the trade arises. I wonder whether we are not losing our sense of proportion over these matters for this continual demand for less training of a general character and the greater specialisation must ultimately result in a reduction in industrial and commercial efficiency. The obvious solution to this problem is day training for apprentices, but very few except the most progressive employers will agree that such an arrangement is both desirable and possible. ADVISORY COMMITTEES. "Our advisory committees examine closely the courses operating and the work carried out in the college so that the part the college plays may be satisfactorily co-ordinated with the part taken by industry itself. There is need for a clearer understanding of this by the average employer and there is equally a need for a complete reorientation of the training that is given to our youth. I do not claim, nor have I at any time claimed, that even a complete course of training in the Technical College will give the facility and the speed that are necessary in industry, but as an accessory to training the Technical College can play a much greater part than it is at present allowed to play by industry itself. "As a board criticism of the work being done in the college is always welcome, but it would be unfair to j expect this college to play a full part in the training of apprentices if it is shackled by individuals or bodies who may not have a complete knowledge of the work that requires to be done and is being done. I am certain it is not generally known that we welcome employers who are interested when they visit the college and that visits from apprenticeship committees are equally welcome. It may be that a fuller development of vocational guidance and the placement of youth into industry will result in a dissemination of the work being done jy colleges throughout New Zealand. The 'fol-low-up' work which has been such a proportion of success for vocational guidance work will, through the Vocational Officer, tend to ally factory training and the school training of individuals more closely."

Considerable discussion ensued. It ■was ultimately decided to defer decision pending the receipt of the comment of the Carpenters' and Joiners' Apprenticeship Committee on the director's report.