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The only note of hope in the umpteenth recovery plan for Wallonia: generalize work-study training to resolve the shortcomings of the current qualification system.
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Last week, a famous cartoonist portrayed Elio Di Rupo in the middle of a shabby restaurant renamed: “To the Walloon relaunch – Menu unchanged since 1980 “. In the drawing, the customer at the table wanted to order the menu. The Minister-President replied:” There are no more … “A reference to current events.
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©doc
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The day before the publication, in fact, the press conference of the Walloon government devoted to the presentation of the “Get Up Wallonia” plan went “pschiiit”. No more “Get Up Wallonia” which was to succeed the five Walloon recovery plans that preceded it. In 20 years, it is true, none of these plans weighed positively on any regional economic indicator. In Namur, even the most laudatory commentators no longer seem to really believe in the chances of success of the umpteenth Walloon plan.
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Last week, therefore, the regional authorities were content to take money out of existing envelopes to put everything in a larger envelopee. Almost nothing else. A only note of hope and something new has nevertheless been heard: the Walloon governments and the Wallonia-Brussels Federation say they are ready to generalize work-study training to resolve the shortcomings of the current qualification system (technical and vocational education).
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The performance of work-linked education in Switzerland, known as “apprenticeship”, is spectacular.
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“We must set up a system equivalent to that of Switzerland!”, Assumes the Walloon government bluntly.
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Become Switzerland?
Why Switzerland? Because the performance of work-linked education in Switzerland, known as “apprenticeship”, is spectacular. Two days at school, three days in a company. The Swiss system is clear and efficient. No layers and underlayers. No modesty or mistrust of the outside world. Pupils in Swiss apprenticeship education can enter a company from the age of 15. They take two to four years of training. Upon arrival, all find a job.
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Swiss companies active in more than 200 fields (sales, electronics, personal care, construction, etc.) welcome a percentage of young people whom they train in the latest procedures and technologies. The pupils assimilate the codes, rhythms and attitudes of the world of work. They are immediately employable. Apprenticeship is so popular in Switzerland that it has actually… become the norm. Two thirds of young Swiss people go on an apprenticeship. In the Confederation, the population sees learning as an acceleration of maturity. The choice of apprenticeship does not then bar the way for higher education.
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Switzerland is at full employment. Salaries are high there.
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Neutralize education lobbies
In French-speaking Belgium, on the other hand, work-study training is a rarity. It is only attended by 2.6% of secondary school students. Cefa and Ifapme welcome 12,000 students per year. A ridiculous figure. At the same time, in closed qualifying education, three quarters of teachers in the Wallonia-Brussels Federation do not have the required titles, due to a lack of candidates.
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Half of the qualifying teachers teach in empty classes with obsolete equipment.
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However, the organizing authorities are increasing the number of unoccupied sectors … Half of the qualifying teachers give lessons to empty classes, equipped with obsolete equipment.
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Finally, the youth unemployment rate in Wallonia peaks at 21.7%. Nothing to do with full Swiss employment. And companies are desperate to find qualified workers.
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No wonder we envy Switzerland on the banks of the Meuse.
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As part of the Walloon recovery, the FWB government says today it is ready to lift all taboos to finally align with the alpine system.
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What a shame all the same not to have shown the same determination years ago, during the first discussions on the Pact of excellence… The great construction site of the education revolution in the Wallonia-Brussels Federation was hardly interested, then, in its qualifying education.
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How could it have been otherwise, it is true?
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These are the lobbies that get along and have for decades blocked any serious reform of our education system.
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The political leaders of the time delegated the conception of their reform to the “actors of education”, in other words the lobbies. Let’s name them: the education unions, the organizing powers of the four education networks that have been pulling the plug since 1958, the various associations including the parents’ associations of each of the networks, to which are added a pinch of experts influential education and sometimes some professional federations.
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These are the lobbies that get along and have for decades blocked any serious reform of our education system. Once again, they will have the most to lose from switching to the Swiss learning mode. No more redundant channels, but guaranteed funding, no more watertight networks, power games, closed envelopes, deafness with regard to the needs of society and the additional cost of the model allowed by the cowardice of the French-speaking political world. has refused for thirty years to face the guardians of the Temple of French-speaking education.
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The payer-citizen must be the decision-maker
However, this cowardice comes at a terrible price: the stagnation of the Walloon economy for forty years.
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Do the regional authorities now want to transform Wallonia into the Switzerland of Plats pays? Chick. But they must impose the Swiss apprenticeship system on the education lobbies by reminding them that the payer-citizen is the decision maker and that today it is their sovereign choice to which they should submit for good.
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Through Jean-Yves Huwart, entrepreneur and author.
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