The world is left to the young. It is the one of the most famous proverbs, especially when speaking of the Croatian economy and the common goal – the economic development and growth. Did you know that 70% of Croatian students attends the vocational education and training!? Although very often, vocational skills and competences are not appreciated in our country compared with the university education, the work of “true” masters is being talked about for days, wages of numerous chefs are at the level of managerial ones and to get the haircut you need to schedule at the hairdresser’s salon days before. In short, in our country, but also in Europe and the world, often the best standard of living have people with the vocational education and training.
The professionalism and quality of work are the guarantee for success in vocational occupations. The apprenticeship, as the special form of work-based learning combining the training at the work place with the education in the vocational school, is the guarantee for every young persons to systematically work on developing knowledge and skills to become the expert who can develop the quality of her/his work during the whole work life time.
The common goal should be creating a competent young person who will add the extra value to her/his life through work, but also to contribute the society in whole. To achieve this goal, the only possibility is the quality cooperation between all stakeholders. Therefore, the apprenticeship should be the result of the coordinated work between the economy, which has to take responsibility for the quality of vocational education, and the education, which has to be ready for true partnership and cooperation.
In order to motivate craftsmen to take young persons for apprentices and teach them “secrets of craft”, but also to familiarise the wider public with the benefits of apprenticeship, the Croatian Chamber of Trades and Crafts has chosen several craftsmen from different parts of Croatia as “apprenticeship ambassadors”.
Mr Dalibor Čermak, the master electrician from Bjelovar, is one of them. He has only words of appraisal for apprentices he has taught, and he employed five of them already since he sees the possibility to recognize and raise the future quality worker as the big advantage for employers to get involved in apprenticeship.
