Apprenticeships are not high quality enough, report says

Instead of increasing the number of apprenticeships the government should focus on improving their quality, according to the Sutton Trust.

The report Better Apprenticeships, published on 30 November, says that although England has “some good quality apprenticeships, too many are failing to provide sufficient training”.

Many apprenticeships do not offer enough access to skilled work to enable participants to progress, it said. Just 17 per cent of young people who embark on a level two apprenticeship progress to a level three, the report found. Progression to higher-level qualifications is “crucial to the workplace prospects of young people, and too often they run into an invisible ceiling,” it said.