The Success of Apprenticeships

27Job Quality: A Challenge for the Effectiveness of Higher Education Apprenticeships

27.1. Introduction

Apprenticeships are now becoming an essential path to employability for students, a commitment assumed by the public authorities in France for the employment of young people and also for the competitiveness of companies.

However, there is a difficulty in reconciling certain strategic choices made by companies in terms of flexibility and apprentices’ expectations. Job quality makes sense here. It is about integrating and considering apprentices into the company through the development and use of skills, recognition, caring, autonomy, coaching and mentoring for career development.

Apprenticeships in higher education have expanded over the past decade or so. Higher education apprentices represent about 36% of the apprenticeship contracts signed in 2015–2016 (Department of assessment and forecasting 2017). This trend is confirmed by the evolution of levels III (Brevet de technicien supérieur, Diplôme universal), I and II (diploma equal to or greater than Bac +3), which increased by 3.8% in 2015 in comparison to 2014 (+2.7% for BTS and other diplomas at the same level and +5% for diplomas at a level higher than Bac +2), while the trend is downward in the other categories: -1.6% at level V (CAP) and – 3.1% at level IV (vocational bac and professional certificate).

This trend, which is generally favorable to the development of higher education, should not overshadow the difficulty ...