After all, 70 percent of trainees are satisfied with their training. (Symbolic photo) Photo: Shutterstock
Trainees complain about regular overtime more frequently than ever before. In the new DGB training report, 40 percent stated that they regularly had to work overtime. This is a new high, reported the German Trade Union Confederation (DGB) in Düsseldorf. Ten percent reported receiving no compensation for overtime.
For its new report, the DGB surveyed around 2,000 trainees from North Rhine-Westphalia in the 23 most popular training occupations. The absent trainer also achieved a new high: almost ten percent (9.7) of those surveyed said that there was no trainer at their training location – that was also a high. Nevertheless: 70 percent of trainees are satisfied with their training.
NO PLAN: Despite the general satisfaction, according to DGB state chairwoman Anja Weber, there are some significant deficiencies. For example, 40 percent of the trainees surveyed did not have a company training plan. These trainees would therefore have no opportunity to check whether they are being taught all the content that is necessary to achieve the training goal.
RELATED TO TRAINING: Almost 17 percent stated that they were always or often assigned to work that was not related to training. Two years ago it was just under twelve percent. “It is always the same professions in which we find significant deficits,” said Andreas Jansen, head of the youth department at the DGB NRW.
FLOP: At the lower end of the evaluation scale were the training courses for salespeople, medical assistants, plant mechanics, painters and varnishers, hotel specialists and hairdressers. “Especially in view of the shortage of skilled workers, employers must act now and significantly improve the training conditions in the affected professions,” says Jansen.
TOP: The best grades were given to prospective mechatronics engineers, industrial mechanics, carpenters, bank clerks, IT specialists and gardeners. The key lies in good trainers: the more qualified the trainers, the lower the dropout rates.
VOCATIONAL SCHOOL: It seems paradoxical. In 2022, i.e. during the corona pandemic, satisfaction with vocational school lessons was highest (59.4 percent); since then it has been declining and has reached 52.5 percent, the second lowest value since 2012. Above all, the technical quality of the teaching is criticized – which is rated as only “satisfactory” or worse by around half of the vocational students (while the technical quality of the training in the company is rated as “good” or “very good” by two thirds becomes). It is said that the comparatively poor assessment of vocational schools is primarily due to the personnel and material resources.
Source: DGB training report
OFFER: With almost 109,000 training contracts concluded, the number was 0.3 percent below the 2023 level. The pre-pandemic level has not yet been reached again. At the same time, a fifth of young people in North Rhine-Westphalia remain without vocational training, although almost one in ten training positions will remain unfilled in 2023. Only 21 percent of NRW companies even provide training.
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