Description
This paper documents and finalises some work undertaken for the Apprenticeships for the 21st Century Expert Panel. It aims to explain the extent to which variation in apprenticeship completion rates can be attributed to factors relating to 'culture' of the employer and apprentice. 'Culture', in this case, refers to employer size, type (government, private or group training) and intensity of trades workers in the apprentice's home suburb. The authors find that all of these have an effect on apprenticeship completion rates.
Summary
About the research
This paper documents and finalises some work undertaken for the Apprenticeships for the 21st Century Expert Panel. It aims to explain the extent to which variation in apprenticeship completion rates can be attributed to factors relating to the ‘culture’ of the employer and the apprentice. Data on these types of factors are very difficult to obtain, and the authors go to considerable trouble to create two variables that reflect some aspects of ‘culture’. These are the social background of the apprentice and the size of the employer. The first is based on population census data and consists of the proportion of those in trades employment in particular areas. The idea was that apprentices from areas of high trade intensity would benefit from higher levels of social support, and this support in turn is likely to be conducive to undertaking an apprenticeship. The second of these was obtained by taking one quarter’s data from the National Apprentice and Trainee Collection and clerically matching employer names with apprentices to count the number of apprentices employed by each employer. The study also looked at the role of employer type (government, group training organisations and private employers).
Key messages
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Size matters: employers with at least 25 apprentices have much higher apprenticeship completion rates than smaller employers.
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Social background matters: those apprentices who live in areas where there is a greater concentration of trade employment have higher completion rates than those who live in areas with a low concentration of trade employment.
- Employer type matters: apprentices with government employers have much higher completion rates than those with private employers. Group training organisations have completion rates a little higher than private employers.
The authors point out the challenges in making use of these findings. In particular, the low apprenticeship completion rates associated with small employers are likely to be difficult to address, primarily because there are large numbers of such employers, and they employ a very large proportion of apprentices.
Tom Karmel
Managing Director, NCVER