Only about half of aspiring tradespeople challenging Certificate of Qualification trade standards exams in Ontario pass.
That was one statistic revealed during Skilled Trades Ontario’s “STO on the Road” event in Sudbury on Sept. 14.
Skilled Trades Ontario is an agency of the Ministry of Labour, Immigration, Training and Skills Development responsible for apprenticeship and skilled trades certification in Ontario.
CEO Candice White is touring the province, with the aim of connecting with apprentices, employers, educators and industry partners.
One of those in attendance at the Sudbury event, which was held at Collège Boréal, asked White about success rates on Certificate of Qualification exams.
“I think everyone in the room knows we have a waning number of journeymen in the trades, lots of apprentices coming in,” but many are not making the cut, said the participant.
Ontario is in line with the national average when it comes to the pass rate on Certificate of Qualification exams, which is about 52 per cent, White revealed.
To change this situation, Skilled Trades Ontario has implemented a program where skilled trades students can write their exams at their college where they’re comfortable instead of waiting “weeks or months” to write it at a government building, she said.
“We are seeing a change with the success and just the comfortability in writing the exam when they’re writing it, you know, in a location where they’re familiar,” she said. “So that is super important.”
Tackling the issue of finding placements for novice apprentices, which has also been an issue, Skilled Trades Ontario has also opened 24 offices in colleges across the province.
White said these are aimed at “putting faces back out into communities to ensure they can make those connections to assist apprentices, assist employers, and assist sponsors with navigating the system.”
She said these offices have been “invaluable, because communities and their colleges are already connected, and so the students and the apprentices and the employers already have a familiarity. So now we’re just not another government office.”
White said there’s currently about 100,000 apprentices in Ontario, but “we need to add about 400,000 skilled workers across the gamut.”
Sudbury MPP Jamie West, who was in attendance at the STO on the Road event, said he thinks awareness of the skilled trades should be introduced to younger grades, as high school is too late.
White said she’s always advocating for more exposure to the skilled trades, and if she had “the ability to wave a genie wand,” she’d write curriculum for younger grades on the issue.
She said she does have a meeting coming up with Ontario Education Minister Paul Calandra, and plans to bring up this point.
Beyond bringing in more young people, White said there’s also an issue with a lack of mid-career skilled tradespeople right now.
“I need a time machine to go back 10 or 15 years and have folks make different decisions to focus on trades all the way through, and not just the point in time when we need them, and that’s the blunt truth,” she said.
But White did highlight some good news.
She said skilled trades have also become more popular among women, with their numbers now at 15 per cent (that actually just went up — it was at 14 per cent last month).
And efforts to promote the skilled trades among young people have made a difference.
“We are seeing a change in this stigma when it comes to young people considering a trade as a career pathway,” White said, adding that Skilled Trades Ontario is seeing 60,000 people at its career fairs and increased numbers in registration.
“I never like to say broad stroke comments because geographically things are very different in certain parts of the province, but we are seeing a change in momentum,” White said, adding that “now we need to capitalize on it.”
Heidi Ulrichsen is Sudbury.com’s assistant editor. She also covers education and the arts scene.
