Made In B.C. – Volume V A History of Postsecondary Education in British Columbia Apprenticeship And Pre-Apprenticeship Training Bob Cowin Douglas College March 2012 Preface While I‟m much better informed about the apprenticeship world as a result of preparing this history, I don‟t yet feel that I really understand it. Yes, I grasp some aspects not too badly, but the metaphor of peeling layers of an onion is hard to shake. I think that if I can just determine what lies beneath a layer, clarity will be attained. Instead, more questions emerge and another layer remains to be peeled. Am I typical? I don‟t know, but I suspect far more people have an incomplete and simplistic view of apprenticeship and pre-apprenticeship training than they either recognize or desire. Judging by the difficulty I encountered in finding answers to a number of my questions, this situation may even characterize some individuals who work as educators and administrators in providing trades training. The trades training environment is challenging, compounded by a generation of marginalization despite society‟s platitudes about the importance of a skilled workforce. As I‟ve endeavoured to immerse myself in the apprenticeship world, and to view it through the eyes of educators beset by constraints and complexities, I‟ve come to appreciate their dedication and to become even more distrustful of glib recommendations for change. So take this document simply as a springboard, a starting point towards a better understanding of an important component of both the BC postsecondary education system and the province‟s labour force. Perhaps more than for any other sector of postsecondary education, an appreciation of past issues and practices is key to ensuring that trades training in the future remains relevant and vital. History is not the past, but a map of the past drawn from a particular point of view to be useful to the modern traveler. - Henry Glassie Other papers in this series on the history of postsecondary education in British Columbia: Overview (2007) Faith-Based Institutions (2009) Continuing Education in Public Institutions (2010) Aboriginal Postsecondary Education (2011) Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication Cowin, Bob, 1954- Apprenticeship and pre-apprenticeship training / Bob Cowin. (Made in B.C.: a history of postsecondary education in British Columbia; v. 5) Includes bibliographical references. ISBN: 9781896019314 1. Postsecondary education--British Columbia. 2. Apprenticeship programs--British Columbia. 3. Universities and colleges--British Columbia--History. 4. Education, Higher--British Columbia--History. I. Title. (Series) LA418.B7 C69 2012 378.711 Contents Summary Introduction 1 Glossary 5 Context 11 International 11 Canada 13 Role of Federal Government 15 Developments to 1995 19 Early Days 19 Provincial and Federal Interaction 22 Tensions within BC 23 Occupational Training Council 25 TRAC 26 Provincial Legislation 30 Recent Developments: 1996 to Present 32 BC Labour Force Development Board 32 Industry Training and Apprenticeship Commission 33 Industry Training Authority 35 Providers of In-School Training 41 Public Institutions 41 Vocational Schools 42 Designated Trainers 54 Secondary School Programs 61 Topics and Issues 62 Completion rates 62 Entrance Standards, Exit Examinations and Challenge Processes 64 Funding for Students and Employers 67 Marginalization 68 Modularization and Progressive Credentials 69 Organizations 70 Program Development 71 Registrations 73 Surveys 74 Stakeholders 77 Under-Represented Groups and Target Groups 78 Miscellaneous 80 Concluding Thoughts 82 Bibliography 83 Appendices 86 A. Challenges Enumerated by the Canadian Apprenticeship Forum, 2004 86 B. Registration Statistics, 1935 – 2010 88 C. Fulltime Equivalent Enrolment, Public Institutions, 1990 – 2010 90 D. Trades List 2011 91 Summary This paper focuses on formal, registered forms of apprenticeship in British Columbia that are at least one year in duration. It also encompasses preparatory programs for apprenticeship that are at least one month in duration. Apprenticeship in Canada is increasingly distinctive from the rest of the developed world. Within Canada, the situation varies by province and territory, despite considerable influence by the federal government through such means as grants to provinces, the purchase of training, and the establishment of advisory and coordinating bodies. From 1900 to the start of World War I, school boards in Vancouver and Victoria introduced vocational training at night school for adults, and some unions managed apprenticeships. BC‟s Apprenticeship Act of 1935, modeled on 1928 Ontario legislation, brought apprenticeship under the purview of government, although government‟s involvement increased only slowly. The Act was administered by the Department of Labour, a separation from the administration of the rest of postsecondary education that has largely persisted to the present. (Another enduring characteristic has been a high degree of central, but not necessarily coordinated, control of apprenticeship by government or its designate.) With the passing in 1940 of the federal Vocational Training Co-Ordination Act and the 1945 Vocational Schools Assistance Act, federal influence grew in vocational training. The Technical and Vocational Training Act of 1960 provided extensive capital funding that led to the construction of the nine regional BC Vocational Schools. The federal government purchased seats in institutions for the technical training of apprentices and subsidized apprentice‟s living costs during that training. In the 1980s, federal policy shifted, gradually reducing general funding and redirecting money towards targeted populations and towards private sector trainers. By the mid nineties, the federal government ended both direct financial support and policy direction for apprenticeship and related training. Although its interventionist approach in this area of provincial educational jurisdiction had ended, it continued to provide significant funding to BC under labour market and other agreements, some of which still finds its way into the apprenticeship world and has a steering effect on it. It also maintained indirect influence through sector councils, initiatives supported by Human Resources and Skills Development Canada, the Canadian Council of Directors of Apprenticeship, and so on. BC‟s first postsecondary vocational training institution was the tiny Dominion-Provincial Youth Training Centre in Nanaimo. Opening in 1936, it eventually became a school in the BC Vocational Schools system, merged into Malaspina College, and is now a component of Vancouver Island University. (BC is in the curious position today of having some colleges that do not provide trades training, but universities which do.) World War II affected BC‟s apprenticeship system, a system which was geared until the 1960s to serving youth under the age of 21. As apprentices enlisted in the military, employers were reluctant to take on apprentices because of their obligations to existing apprentices after the war. The Vancouver School Board has played a significant role in the formation of several of BC‟s postsecondary institutions. It opened the Vancouver Vocational Institute (VVI) in 1949 in downtown Vancouver. Enrolment grew rapidly and overcrowding, which led to some double and triple shifts and the leasing of temporary space off campus, was an ongoing theme for two decades. In the early 1970s, VVI was gradually merged into Vancouver Community College. i The system of BC Vocational Schools was administered centrally by the Department of Education in Victoria. The flagship school in Burnaby opened in 1960, several schools opened in 1963, and the last schools came on stream in Dawson Creek in 1966, Terrace in 1968, and Kamloops in 1971. As part of their program mix, the schools offered pre-apprenticeship programs and technical training for apprentices. In 1971, BC announced its intention to meld the Vocational Schools into the emerging community college system. A move unwelcomed by the Schools, their facilities provided permanent space for several fledgling colleges. The first merger occurred in Prince George that year, with other mergers taking place over the next four years. With pre-apprenticeship training in educational institutions administered by the Apprenticeship Branch of the BC Department of Labour, the Department of Education came in the 1960s to fund a parallel stream of trades training, known as pre-employment training, for students who were not eligible for apprenticeship (e.g. they were too old, or did not want to follow the apprenticeship route.) Administrative tensions grew in the 1970s and by 1977, the Commission on Vocational, Technical and Trades Training had identified an urgent need to reduce red tape and duplication of decision making in managing vocational training. It noted that many employers were not carrying their fair share of the training load, called for more classroom time and bemoaned the multiplicity of agencies involved in the selection of students for apprenticeships. The Occupational Training Council was established in 1978 as a response to the Commission‟s recommendations, but lasted only until 1983. Prompted by a cabinet decision in 1982 to simply terminate pre-apprenticeship/pre-employment programs, the Ministries of Labour and of Education were able to convince the politicians to instead embark on a major reform. The resulting Training Access (TRAC) pre-apprenticeship program was hastily