Province Spending on Skills Training
Monday, December 5, 2011 @ 9:48 AM
Vancouver, B.C. – The Province has committed to spend $10 million for skills-training funding over the next three years. The funding is being made available to help develop new training programs to meet the growing labour market demand.
Pat Bell, Minister of Jobs, Tourism and Innovation made the announcement this morning at a skills development conference in Vancouver. "Industry sector groups are in a strong position to know exactly what skills their sectors need” says Bell. “ It’s important that we give them the tools and funding to deliver on those training needs, so that we are better able to train the right people, for the right jobs, at the right time."
Sector or industry-based organizations experiencing a significant labour-market challenge are eligible to apply. Industry-sector organizations will be able to receive up to $500,000 per training project.
Examples of training programs that would qualify include:
- Certification training for a group of low-skilled employed workers to help meet an identified labour shortage in a particular occupation (e.g. training heavy-equipment operators and drivers to meet job opportunities in northern B.C.’s mining sector).
- Training programs for unemployed workers to better prepare them for working in a high-demand occupation (e.g. training unemployed workers for opportunities in the ship-building industry).
- Training for low-skilled workers related to new equipment, technology or work processes (e.g. retail workers are required to learn a new inventory-management system that is being widely implemented across numerous businesses).
Skills training programs will focus on:
- Unemployed individuals who have not had an Employment Insurance claim in the past three years, or five years in the case of parental leave, or * Low-skilled individuals who do not have any post-secondary education toward a university degree and lack a high-school diploma (or equivalent); or who have a high-school diploma (or equivalent) but do not have any recognized certification.
Comments
Typically reactive move.
organizations will be able to receive up to $500,000 per training project.
Sounds like we will be feeding our friends in high places.
Chjeers
Another subsidy for big business.
So I wonder how many hoops one will have to jump through to get this funding, or is it really reserved for family, friends of government workers.
Doesn’t matter what he does, him and his government is out of here as soon as Crusty calls an election
I wish they would use this money to pay for the training directly between the student and the facility providing the training. Skip the middlemen/women who cash in on this.
Give money to students who are enrolled or enrolling in the programs that meet their requirements. Don’t freaking give it out to the so-called training organizations. Yeesh!
What am I doing wrong???every time a program pops up like this seems like I end up on a waiting list, then just opting to pay for what ever tickets I needed to qualify for certain positions ..
Read carefully what the funding is for and who will receive the money in the first instance.
1. “The funding is being made available to help DEVELOP (not DELIVER) NEW training PROGRAMS to meet the growing labour market demand.”
2. “Industry-sector ORGANIZATIONS will be able to receive up to $500,000 per TRAINING PROJECT.”
This is not money going to training institutions whether private or public. It is also not going to employees or even employers directly. It is going to business associations who have put together a needs assessment and a method of meeting those needs via training which is meant to address the specific need(s).
gus, could you please name the a business association that would be involved in this kind of business?
Also, if you read the article carefully, it shows examples of training programs. Don’t we have some of these already? I don’t think it’s a case of needing more programs, I think it’s a case of having more people go through them. Like I said before, give the money to the students to do their training. That solves the problem of labour shortages.
I don’t think the industry sector wants to train the students themselves, unless it’s in the form of apprenticeships, in which case give the money to the students’ employers.
Mining and ship building were mentioned. I will provide one of each to start. I am sure that unions might want to put in proposals as well. Perhaps they could even go in jointly with the business associations. In addition, they might want to join forces with private or public education organizations that may either have some courses or programs already, such as BCIT specifically.
The way I read it, it is geared to be industry driven, not educator driven.
MABC = Mining Association of BC
PCSA = Pacific Coast Shipbuilders Association
The Association for Retail Entrepreneurs (Retail BC and Retail Alberta)
Those three address the industries identified. I am sure that there are others who deal with those three sectors as well.
Then there are others who might also want to try …. CILA, COFI, TLA, FARSHA, Construction Associations, etc.
If programs exist that fit the bill, that is great. If there are some that need to be tweaked or require training on the job, then that is great to.
I think the key here is that industry has to be involved rather than paying people to go to educational institutes and end up without a job at the end.
At least, that is what I read into it and I hope that is what the intent is. We need to approach training for specific skills a bit differently in Canada than we have done, in my opinion.
http://www.aved.gov.bc.ca/sector-partnerships/welcome.htm
From the above site which deals with the Provincial-Federal agreement.
“Labour Market Sector Solutions Program
This program is designed to respond to demand from sector groups who have significant labour market issues (e.g., workforce UP SKILLING, skill shortages) and no training funding vehicle by which to address them.”
“Labour Market Partnerships funds projects that encourage and support employers, employee and/or employer associations and communities in developing and implementing strategies for dealing with labour force adjustments and meeting human resource requirements.”
BTW, $10 million is a drop in the bucket. The ship builders would eat that up all by themselves and still be looking for the main course I am sure.
However, I assume that there is money for that in their contract with the Feds that they just managed to get.
I guess this is why the big industry players like Canfor do not take on new apprentices. They can just whine and snivel about the looming trades shortages which they have known about for years; and their friends in Big government will throw money at it for them.
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