He’s only 18, but Brandon Udy is already well on his way to becoming an automotive service technician.
The Salmon Arm Secondary graduate recently completed two apprenticeship programs provided by his school in partnership with the Ministry of Education and the Industry Training Authority (ITA). He now works fulltime at the Salmon Arm Frame and Body Shop.
“That’s the biggest thing for me – I got a head start,” he said November 24 at the ITA’s sixth annual Youth Day trades conference in Vancouver, where he was a featured speaker.
The Accelerated Credit for Enrolment Industry Training (ACE-IT) program allows high-school students to complete the in-school component of a Level 1 apprenticeship by as early as Grade 10. In addition to ACE-IT, the Secondary School Apprenticeship (SSA) program provides students with on-site work experience required for an apprenticeship and YES 2 IT educates Grade 6 to 9 students about the trades.
By taking ACE-IT or SSA, students graduate from high school having already completed the first phase of an apprenticeship. That gives them a competitive advantage with potential employers, who won’t have to spend weeks teaching them the basics of their trades.
“The whole point of it was you’re in your Grade 12 year,” Udy said. “You get the head start, plus they set you up more with where you get to work.”
Udy began his training in Grade 11 with an SSA placement at an auto body shop. In Grade 12, he enrolled in ACE-IT and took online Vancouver Community College courses. By graduation he had also worked eight weeks at the Salmon Arm Frame and Body Shop.
According to the ITA, 11,000 youth have participated in ACE-IT since its inception in 2005. SSA, which was established in 1995, has attracted more than 10,000 students.
ITA CEO Kevin Evans pointed out that there will be a huge shortage of skilled trades workers in B.C. during the next decade .
“We’ve got more people who’ll be leaving the workforce through retirement than are coming in, and that means we’re going to be facing shortages.”
Evans is concerned that the B.C. economy will be at a serious disadvantage if those shortages aren’t filled quickly.
“If we want to achieve our potential, if we want to see continued growth and prosperity in B.C. we’ve got to develop a training culture in this province.”
He pointed to benefits of trades training, including good pay and job opportunities anywhere in the country.
The first year tuition for an arts degree at UBC is more than $4,500 for domestic students. Aside from textbooks, there are no tuition costs for the ACE-IT program, and students are almost guaranteed a job after graduation.
Evans said that too much emphasis in B.C. is placed on preparing students for university. “In our secondary school system, only 20% of the kids in the high schools in B.C. today are going to graduate from university. What are we doing for the other 80%? A university degree is one post-secondary pathway. All we’re saying is that there are others, and they’re equally valuable.”
(See Timothy Renshaw’s Public Offerings, page 32.)