"BROKEN DOWN"

Evening Post, Volume CXXXIV, Issue 78, 29 September 1942, Page 4

"BROKEN DOWN"

TRAINING OF BOYS

INDUSTRIAL PROBLEM "The training of apprentices in industry has broken down," said Mr. it. G. Ridling, director of the Wellington Technical Cdllege, to the Board of Governors of the college at tfteit meeting last night, and he presented a report in which he suggested a possible solution of the problem. The board decided to refer the report to the Department Of Education aria to a special committee which co-operates with the Rehabilitation Board and to suggest to both that a national conference of all interested parties should be held to discuss the problem. The board had before it a report from the vocational guidance officer, Mr. A. A. Kirk, who said that the general decline of the apprenticeship | training system had been obvious for many years, and that the war had created a state; of affairs which was even more unsatisfactory. "During the last two months/" he said, "we have had several boys seeking apprenticeships in the building and electrical trades. In spite of the fact that these lads were well trained and qualified for such work, our placement officer had the greatest difficulty in finding suitable positions for them. For a while the situation appeared to be hopeless. Employers stated that they had not the journeymen, or that the trade was in a state of such uncertainty that they felt they could not . engage apprentices. Others were so busy with war contracts that they had not the time to bother about apprentices. The situation became so serious that we decided to examine our figures for the last twelve months. Both the building and electrical trades showed a definite decline in the number of applications for apprentices. Only twenty boys have been apprenticed to carpentry and joinery through the Wellington Government Youth Centre durhig the past twelve months, and thirteen of these were placed in January and February of this year. "OUfLOQK IS BAD," "In the. electrical trade we have placed only twelve apprentices for the year. The two technical colleges alone offer between fifty and sixty building students for the carpentry and joinery trade every year, while it must also be remembered that other schools have many worthy applicants. The figures for the electrical trade are a little ihore difficult to obtainbut my rough estimate Of the number of Suitable applicants per annum is in the vicinity of sixty. And yet we have only twelve vacancies. . . . Summing up the position of these two trades, it can safely be said that the 1 outlook for building students is, at the moment, bad. Boys with electrical ability can be placed, but whether they are entering on a safe and useful career is certainly a matter of doubt/ 1 In his report Mr. Ridling said that the revelations of the vocational guidance officer were ,not limited to two sections of industrial activity but were cornrrioh to a wide range of activities. "The following suggestions," he continued, "arranged chronologically, may deserve discussion as a possible solution:— "14-15 years, prevocational training as at present. "16-17 years, specialised teaching of the vocation in trade or career training sections in most primary schools or in schools attached to Government workshops or to large and comprehensive industrial or commercial units. "18 years till demobilisation, military training and instruction in specialised . units of Army, Navy, or Air Force. "Rehabilitation Period after Demobilisation.—First year; attendance at trade training schools: second arid third years, improvers in industry; or, first, second, and third years, as industrial trainees in industry with compulsory attendance at the Technical College for trade training. "In this scheme the sixteenth and seventeenth years are important. Young people are not being industrially rooted at present, but are entering the Army, indifferently prepared for military work and Without any security for the post-war years. If boys take up work during these years some effort to provide daylight training at technical schools should be made by employers, for it has become abundantly ! clear this year that the long hours at • work and in the multifarious militant civil activities have affected adversely ' their training in evening classes. "For those students who are able to continue college training through these years I am prepared to arrange instruction on a trade basis and with a trade ritual and to urge the continua--1 tion, of the training in the military education system after the boys are called up for service. The adoption of such a scheme would mean that they ■do not become wage-earners until they reach their eighteenth year, but they would by that .time be fairly skilled in trade practice."