).
Barriers related to young people’s image of and attitudes toward the trades are further reinforced by a lack of information available to youth about career paths in the trades and about apprentice-ship options and process. In part, this attitude reflects society’s focus on university education, as well as the trades’ failure to promote themselves
through career information (Macdonald and Associates, 1998; Viswanathan, 2002; Select Standing Committee on Education, 2002; Information Development and Training Inc., 2001). Many key government informants also pointed out this lack of awareness, information and interest, and argued that it applies broadly to schools, families and society in general ().
In a related fashion, for interested individuals, it is often difficult to identify employers who might be a potential sponsor of apprenticeship training, because so much recruitment depends on informal contacts. It is perceived that per- sonal contacts such as family and friends may be one of the means by which some trades-related jobs and apprenticeships are accessed. Those without the contacts, therefore, may have a very difficult time finding employers to hire them.
These deficits are compounded by a lack of clearly articulated career paths to enable individuals
to move between secondary school programs and the apprenticeship stream (Economic
Council of Canada, 1992). Students are simply unaware of the steps they can take toenter into apprenticeship—including how to findan employer—despite numerous informationcampaigns and products targeted at providinginformation on trades and apprenticeship (
).Students also often lack the knowledge, skillsand confidence to find employers to apprenticewith, or the techniques to find jobs (CLFDB,1994, Zimmerman, 2001).
The lack of personal contacts between tradesper-sons and potential apprentices represents an additional barrier. Focus-group participants pointed to poor linkages between schools and employers, and to employers and tradespeople having little contact with schools, which they visited only rarely ().
The complexity of the apprenticeship process itself can be confusing for apprentices and employers alike. Young people have difficulty finding out about how to pursue an apprentice-ship, which some respondents felt was more of a problem than with other educational programs (). As a result, young people may need a con-tact or family member to help them get into an apprenticeship (Convergence Management Consultants Ltd., 1996; MacCulloch and Henley, 2002). One key informant also pointed out thatrequirements for applying for financial assistancecan be equally confusing to young apprentices ().