French government announces plans to reform training programs

We know more about the government’s calendar for its major project of reform of vocational training and apprenticeship.

 

Preparatory consultations began on 10 November with the various social partners to clarify the content along the lines defined by the government.

 

A first draft law should be presented in late January 2018 for a presentation of the final framework set in the spring.

 

Governmental objectives

 

As stated by the Prime Minister, the overhaul of vocational training has as its main objective “[to] offer new protections and real guarantees to the assets” in the interest of securing training and skills courses.

 

Learning is the first issue that will be studied with the stated aim of profoundly transforming this training device and promoting its readability by the different actors. Indeed, the numbers of apprenticeship entries in France are far from the targets of 500,000 apprentices posted by the previous government with (only) 412 3000 apprenticeship contracts signed in 2016.

 

Reorganising and reassessing apprenticeships

 

The learning reform axes set by the government focus mainly on the question of the role of the professional branches in the organization of training and the adaptation of the training offer to the reality of the needs of the labor market. employment. Last September, Emmanuel Macron had already mentioned his desire to see the weight of branches increase in the organization of learning.

 

The Minister of Labor thus raises the question of adapting the mapping of apprenticeship training to the needs of companies and branches. This indicates a willingness of the government to strengthen the role of companies and branches in the establishment of training offer and qualification benchmarks.

 

In addition, the weakness of the value of learning to the target audience was also pointed out by the Minister of Labor. Thus, the means to improve the image and visibility of the curriculum within the guidance system will be one of the topics of discussion. The Minister of National Education has made a proposal that learning should be displayed and offered at the college to encourage the orientation of students to this path of training.

 

On the other hand, consultations will also affect funding, especially to simplify the system, as well as the status of the apprentice as well as the apprentice master.

 

Government lays out the framework for reforms

 

As for the reform of the labor code, the government will use the consultation with the main interlocutors concerned to reform apprenticeship.

 

Under the leadership of Sylvie Brunet, Associate Professor at Kedge Business School and member of the Social and Environmental Economic Council (CESE), appointed to take charge of steering the consultations, preparatory work groups with the social partners started on 10 November to to engage this second part of the great program of renovation of the French social model of the government.

 

Each working group will have to return a copy by the end of January next year, in order to be able to present the general bill in the spring of 2018. Exchanges between social partners and ministries of national education and work will be facilitated through a framework guidance document provided by the Government.

 

In the main issues for the moment on the agenda, we note the valuation of the professional path, the status of the apprentice, the funding of apprenticeship as well as training cards and the construction of diplomas.