SYSTEMATIC APPROACH TO ENHANCE THE PARTICIPATION OF CONSTRUCTION INDUSTRY SMES IN APPRENTICESHIP PROGRAMS: CO.TUTOR PROJECT

Construction industry has been suffered the economic crisis strongly and now faces an increasingly demand of skilled workforce, due to both its technification increase and the replacement of the workers who will retire soon.

In this sense, the public authorities are boosting the commitment to the continuous learning that combines training in the classroom together with practices in a company. Therefore, the need to address youth unemployment through these practices is considered a priority in Spain and Italy, countries in the first positions of Europe with It comes to unemployed youth with no studies (27.6% and 25.8% respectively (OCDE, 2015).

Co.Tutor project was submitted to face this situation, since apprenticeship experience in Spain and Italy is not being as successful as expected. The project has the aim to improve the participation of the SMEs of the building industry in training programs that include practices in companies, such as dual system training, professional certificates, etc.

Vocational Training centres and employer’s associations of the building industry from Spain and Italy are working together to create a leverage effect in apprenticeship culture, addressing the difficulties faced by the SME to host apprentices and the current blurred figure of in-company tutor.

For building SME, a Strategic Roadmap has been defined, learning from EU successful experiences in SMEs participation and working with national stakeholders.

As for in-company tutor, the key actor to ensure the student’s learning success, a Qualification has been design, with the aim to be used as a framework where her/his competences may be recognized, on the basis on an ad-hoc skills recognition system.

The project was funded by the 2016 Call of the Erasmus+ Programme of the European Union, inscribed within Key Action 3 of Support for Policy Reform. It started in October 2016 and ends in September 2018.

The project is coordinated by Fundación Laboral de la Construcción, and works with Confederación Nacional de la Construcción, Associazione Nazionale Costruttori Edili and Ente per la formazione e l´addestramento professionale nell´edilizia. All of them belong, directly or indirectly, in the European Alliance for Apprenticeships, a platform managed by the European Commission since July 2013, which brings together governments with other key stakeholders for the mobility of apprentices.