Training and vocational policy

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This means focusing on the following top policy priorities:

Clear and transparent training regulations

Rules for vocational training programmes need to lay out minimum standards that are closely related to the vocation in question. At the same time, they need to be easy for companies to follow and fulfil. This will encourage companies to take on trainees and integrate them into their ongoing production and service provision operations without having to deal with overly complex structures and multi-company training programmes.

Training opportunities for everyone

Germany faces new challenges in fulfilling its demand for skilled workers. Companies increasingly complain that key training positions remain unfilled because applicants fail to meet the necessary requirements laid down in the training regulations. Given the rapidly and constantly changing conditions of today's economy, it is important to ensure that Germany's dual system of vocational training does not become bogged down with increasingly complicated rules and structures. We need flexibility and dynamism to ensure that our dual vocations reach (i) all company types and sizes and (ii) at least all students who have earned school leaving certificates from general education schools.

Germany has a "dual system" of vocational education that combines traineeships at a company with education in a vocational school. This highly successful system merges the advantages of practical on-the-job training with more theoretical, school-based learning.

To maximise effectiveness, the dual system of vocational education must take into account the varying levels of potential among young people as well as the divergent demands that employers place on their employees. The dual system offers high-performing students every opportunity to maximise their professional development. At the same time, young people from disadvantaged backgrounds must not be allowed to fall through the cracks - they must be able to access vocational education and training programmes without having to deal with waiting lines or interim measures. For this reason, it is important to offer two-year vocational training programmes that lead to qualified jobs. These two-year programmes will be structured in a way that (i) allows them to count toward related occupations requiring three years of vocational training and (ii) provides free access to advanced vocational training.

Germany is also setting up a model that allows for greater permeability within specific vocational fields. This model was launched for the electrical industry in 2009.

Optimising final examinations

Examinations must be designed in a way that makes companies as well as actively employed persons more interested in participating on examination committees. Key priorities in this connection are to establish uniform examination procedures, to ensure that examinations are clearly oriented toward the questions and skills that really matter in a specific vocation, and to streamline examination periods.