National Apprenticeship Week: APSCo outlines apprenticeship reforms for the modern world

Trade association recommendations include recruitment apprenticeship scheme changes

The Association of Professional Staffing Companies (APSCo) has called for a more modern approach to apprenticeships – including those for recruiters themselves – as the UK celebrates National Apprenticeship Week.

Current approaches to apprenticeships require modernisation, which APSCo has highlighted in both its recent Spring Budget Submission and through its work as part of the Recruitment Trailblazers Group. These include:

• Unifying standards for recruitment apprenticeships: Proposing a single recruitment apprenticeship standard at Level 3.
• Introducing flexibility around qualifications: Eliminating mandated qualifications as part of the apprenticeship standard.
• Fairer assessments: Reforming assessment methods to enhance fairness and eliminate the need for lengthy written assessments.
• Inclusivity: Including in-house recruiters in the apprenticeship standard for the recruitment sector.
• Reforming the Apprenticeship Levy: Broadening the scope of the Levy to align with skills needs and improve access for professional contractors, “lane-changers” and older workers.

Tania Bowers, Global Public Policy Director at APSCo, and an Apprenticeship Ambassador, comments:

Apprenticeships are boosting the UK's access to highly valuable skills but so much more can be done and the traditional approach to these training courses needs a rethink that is more appropriate in the modern world of work. We have highlighted in our Spring Budget submission that the Apprenticeship Levy should be reformed to make the funds more accessible to the whole workforce for modular training and more attractive to mid-life career changers. We’ve also highlighted that Levy funds held within the employment sector need to be made available to agency workers, independent professionals and the self-employed.

For the staffing sector itself, there has historically been low uptake levels in apprenticeships. Alongside reforming apprenticeships in the UK, we are also working towards supporting the creation of a viable scheme for the recruitment profession.