DAccording to a study, fewer than half of young people in Germany make the transition from school to training or university in the time allotted for it. While an apprenticeship and a bachelor’s degree usually takes three years, only 43 percent of young adults then have a first degree.
15 percent have not managed to get started after four years or have dropped out of training again. This is shown by an evaluation of data from the National Educational Panel Study (NEPS) by the Universities of Göttingen and Hamburg on behalf of the Bertelsmann Foundation. For this purpose, the educational path after school was analyzed by 7168 people.
“These figures mean that with around 750,000 school leavers every year, more than 100,000 young people are at risk of not having a vocational qualification in the long term,” says Claudia Burkard, training expert at the Bertelsmann Foundation. “As unskilled workers, they have poor chances on the job market. And with it low income, few opportunities for advancement and later a tight pension.”
Often a year or two late
According to the study, an above-average number of the young people affected have a low school qualification, come from disadvantaged families and have a migration background. Just over every fourth woman (27 percent) and every fifth man (20) with a secondary school leaving certificate is not yet in training four years after leaving school.
Every fifth young person only succeeds in making the transition to training or studying after a delay of one or two years. The authors of the study cite problems in the search for the right subject or the right apprenticeship as the reason. Burkard therefore calls for better offers for career orientation in all types of schools. She also pleaded for a state training guarantee: It creates the legal basis for every young person who is willing to be trained to receive a training offer.
In its coalition agreement, the traffic light government agreed on a training guarantee. It is intended to “enable all young people access to fully qualifying vocational training, always primarily in the company”. In regions with a significant undersupply of training places, external training opportunities should be offered in close consultation with the social partners. The employers reject the training guarantee. They argue that the problem is more a lack of trainees than a lack of apprenticeships.
