Bright future for skilled trades
Keys to prosperity: Education Minister touts the province’s apprenticeship program
During her Grade 12 year, Bobbi- Jo Blayone, a First Nations student from Fort St. John, decided on a career path that was far from ordinary. Through an innovative school program that allowed her to earn high school graduation credits while taking apprenticeship training, she enrolled in the Aircraft Maintenance Engineering program at Northern Lights College in Dawson Creek. She graduated from secondary school and became the first woman to apprentice with Northern Cariboo Air.
For Brodie Finlayson, a young graduate of Eric Hamber Secondary School in Vancouver, participating in a dual- credit program gave him the keys to an Auto Collision Repair Technician program, a high school diploma and the opportunity to convert a childhood interest into a viable career.
For Allanah Hjerpe, the electrical training she began taking in Grade 12 at BCIT allowed her to explore an interest in the electrical industry and apply her math skills. Hjerpe’s future employer was so impressed with her ability that she was hired right out of high school.
All three students were participants in ACE IT, an Industry Training Authority program that allows students to earn graduation credits while taking the first year of apprenticeship training.
In the coming years, we’ll need many more young people like Blayone, Finlayson and Hjerpe to meet B. C.’ s labour needs. The B. C. government is working hard to support that goal by expanding pathways to graduation and exploring new ways of getting more students and their parents excited about careers in trades and technology fields.
In B. C., a million job openings are expected by 2022. Fully 43 per cent of those jobs will require skilled workers and some areas of the province are already experiencing significant shortages of skilled workers.
We’ve developed “B. C.’ s Skills for Jobs Blueprint: Re- engineering Education and Training,” which was released last week.
An overarching goal of the plan is to ensure every youth in B. C. gets a head- start to handson learning and is able to capitalize on the exciting and new career opportunities most needed by our growing economy. Another goal is to see a shift in education and training to better match jobs in demand. And finally, we want to build stronger partnerships with industry and labour to deliver training and apprenticeships.
In our K- 12 school system, we’re already making significant progress in a number of key areas. A Superintendent for Careers and Student Transitions has been appointed to help districts develop and expand partnerships with local industry, businesses and postsecondary institutions.
We plan to double the number of ACE IT training spaces to 5,000 during the next two years. We also want to increase the number of employer partnerships that provide job readiness skills and practical learning opportunities for youth.
Throughout B. C., individual school districts are undertaking innovative programs to get students excited and make them more aware of trades and technology careers at a younger age. To provide further support, the Ministry of Education recently introduced a Skills Exploration course for grades 10- 12. The course is designed to give students valuable hands- on experience in important trade sectors and an introduction to core skills common to many trades. The provincial government will also fund apprenticeship trades ambassadors and new online resources to better promote career options and pathways to parents and students.
There’s also new flexibility for school districts to apply provincial funding to scholarships and awards related to trades and technical training. This year, one non- instructional day ( Pro- D) in every school district has been dedicated to skills, trades and apprenticeship training for students and this will be repeated during the next school year.
Clearly, if we can get more young people and parents excited about career opportunities and skills training, and change existing perceptions about “blue collar” work, we’ll ensure more of our young people are first in line for the jobs of the future. Thousands of those jobs will be in B.C.’s emerging liquefied natural gas sector, which promises enormous job growth and a generational opportunity to improve the state of B.C’s economy and the lives of the people who live here. However, we know there will be many other sectors that will require skilled individuals.
All of us will benefit as we work together to build an everincreasing skilled workforce and more of today’s students pursue skilled trades and technology careers that meet the labour needs of a growing and prosperous British Columbia.