The Committee welcomed the initiative taken by the Florence
European Council. It endorsed the Commission communication, subject to a
number of comments and suggestions. It noted with interest the innovative
aspect of the communication which rightly highlighted the positive role which
apprenticeship training could play in contributing to young people’s
integration into employment. However, the Committee put forward the following
main comments and suggestions: specific actions should be carried out for
firms on the quantitative development of apprenticeship training. This
depended ultimately on the will and/or capacity of firms to increase the
number of apprenticeship training places. The Commission and the MemberStates should initiate information and
awareness campaigns for young people, parents, teachers, career advice
centres and the social partners in order to improve the image of
apprenticeship training. To this end the role of Cedefop should be
reinforced. Practical workplace training needed to be continuous. In
particular it must be ensured that apprentices were not assigned to menial
tasks unrelated to the training which they were supposed to be receiving. The
development of apprenticeship training and its extension to other vocations
could be fully achieved only if this was not an end in itself. Apprenticeship
training should open the way to further studies, in particular offering ways
of transferring to higher or university education, whilst taking account of
the vocational training systems of the various Member States. Emphasis should
be placed on the essential links between: the apprentice and his family on
the one hand, and the apprentice’s supervisor and teacher on the other; the
workplace supervisor (whose status, role, knowledge required for the job and
ways of preparing for this, and rights and obligations should be clearly
defined) and the teacher. The European Union should encourage the shared
responsibility of the social partners (employers and workers) for the
operation of apprenticeship training, particularly within training bodies.
The Committee wanted to see a quality survey launched. This should set out
reference values or minimum criteria with a view to identifying the essential
features of a European apprenticeship training model. It would also be useful
to measure the impact of apprenticeship training on labour market integration
and employment.