We have heard an executive from a well-run Fortune 100 company say, "The days of apprenticeship are over.
About 60% of young Germans enrol in this dual system and 57% of those who complete an apprenticeship are immediately employed by their training company.
The most important vehicle for that apprenticeship are the research assistantships students receive as part of their multi-year guaranteed funding package.
Apprentices who are not caught by this category ie aged 19 or over and not in the first year of apprenticeship, are entitled to the minimum rate appropriate for their age.
Apprentices who are under 19, or 19 or over but in the first year of their apprenticeship, are entitled to the apprenticeship rate, which is currently £3.30 per hour (this rate is reviewed every October).
But the metalworking and engineering skills acquired during that tough five-year apprenticeship are at the heart of what Tyas does now, 40 years later, as a designer and maker of fine ironwork, from hand-forged fire irons to wrought-iron curtain poles, chandeliers and lamps.
