Ask my anything about apprenticeships

[Housewife212]

My son has been doing an apprenticeship since September he is 19.
If you have a child thinking about doing one and your not sure please ask me anything 😋

Again, not all apprenticeships are harder (to get, or to do) than uni. Im sure some are, some are not. Remember that you can do apprenticeships in business admin, customer service etc.

Some are practical like child care, hairdressing, building. Hard in their own individual ways.

Nope they are harder than going to uni

Most unis now give unconditional offers

I don't have any kind of agenda other than wanting to see correct information, neither of those statements are true.

It's just daft to say that apprenticeships are harder than going to uni - talk about apples and pears, you're comparing apples with zebras, it's nonsense

Most unis have always made some unconditional offers, that's not news and has nothing to do with apprenticeships.

If you want to advise people on higher level apprenticeships with the company your son works for that's great but it's clear that's as far as your knowledge goes. That's not knocking you, it's just the way it is.

A very small number of unis give unconditional offers. It's not the norm and employers with grad schemes still expect excellent a level results and good degrees from good unis. Many grad entrants have done 4 year degrees with masters for engineering. The next step after grad training is chartership. It's an entirely different career path to the apprentices, who are unlikely to ever be chartered engineers.

But if I had a technically minded child who wasn't particularly academic I would recommend an engineering apprenticeship, but in engineering the grad route is a better path for the more academic.

Do you get paid to do the college side of an apprenticeship? Can you claim working tax credit on an apprenticeship?

Even law is now doing apprenticeships. But there is so few of them. I think it was like 10 places for England. I personally think they are a great way to get qualifications for practical learners (doesn't mean not academic) and it would be great to see more of them.

Op, I am sorry, but you actually failed to provide any proper information except that your son is enjoying his apprenticeship.

As many pointed out there is just such a vast number of different kinds and levels of apprenticeship one person's experience cannot possibly apply to others in a different field, level, company, college. Some are level 4, as your son's afaik, some can be up to level 6 (undergard degree). All are different and hence you get so many different experiences and opinions here. Nothing to do with some agenda.

Congrats to your son on getting into good one and good luck to him!

All companies have to pay the apprenticeship levy which is why they're now doing apprenticeships, even law, otherwise they can't use the levy fund! Law is slow to get off the ground though because most firms prefer the traditional qualifying route. Accountancy has really embraced apprenticeships though.

All companies don't pay the levy, it's only larger employers with wage costs over a certain amount.

There is so much misinformation on this thread, I hope no one is relying on it to help their DC with career choices.

Civil Service apprenticeships are a brilliant way to get on the civil service career pathway. Fast track apprenticeship trainees start on £19500 outside London & once the apprentice has passed their course they can be earning £30000 plus very quickly. Careers include accountancy, policy making, law & finance. You can either choose to stay in the Civil Service for your whole career or stay for long enough to gain experience & move to the private sector, ex HMRC staff are often snapped up by accountancy & banks to work as tax advisors, insolvency practitioners, probate & inheritance tax specialists. Civil Service offers excellent family friendly working, flexible hours, term time working, a good pension & lots of opportunities to gain promotion & move around different departments.

Each type of apprenticeship is different and then there are differences between employers making every individuals experience different.
My apprentices are on 15K ( college counts part of the deal is you pay them to go to go college so that is part of their hourly rate). They go to college one day a week and then have a massive particle log to complete in work, not just doing the tasks, but logging them on the cloud based system. There are multiple exams and then a rigourous practical exam which many fail
Multiple times. We tell them to achieve the qualification they have to pretty much give up everything outside work for three years. Compared to gaining the qualification at uni it is a tough option.

The public sector is an excellent route to accessing apprenticeships. One route with loads of opportunities and very competitive pay is the Armed Forces which is the largest apprenticeship employer.

Apprenticeships are moving from Frameworks to Standards. The latter will be less about continuous formal assessment and more akin to old a levels where the assessment is right at the end. For example, the Level 2 Equine Groom end point assessment is nails!

The Institute for Apprenticeships have a great website where you can view all the Standards, including those in development and info behind the new changes.

Not many companies pay into the levy as your wage bill has to be pretty enormous. Therefore there is loads of help for smaller companies to take on apprentices. Larger companies can even gift some of their unused levy to smaller companies.

It's no longer a route for the unacademic. There are level 6 and 7 apprenticeships in things like architecture and chartered management.

It's definitely a route I would recommend people at the career options point in their life giving serious thought to.