Germany Had the World’s Best Vocational System. What Happened?

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As vocational programs have fallen in prestige, companies say the quality of trainees has declined. Roughly 73% of the German companies surveyed last year complained about not finding suitable applicants.

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Leaning back in his chair, Schulze described Jannes as a stroke of luck. But the other potential Azubis, he added, were a different story.

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“The hardest case was the one on drugs,” he recalled. “He could barely hold a piece of wood at 10am.”

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Germany’s more than 3,600 vocational schools are set up to train students in topics specific to their future careers. A visitor to a vocational school might see future hoteliers learning about the basics of concierge work or aspiring electricians studying power circuits. Training is also on offer in subjects as varied as graphic design, nursing and landscaping.

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“If there were no vocational schools, background knowledge in many areas would simply not exist,” explained Andreas, a vocational teacher who asked to be identified by his first name only as his school didn’t give him permission to talk about his job publicly. “For example, a heating engineer needs to know how a heat pump works.”

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Vocational schools, however, aren’t always able to keep pace with industry. As making any changes to the national framework requires buy-in from representatives of companies, trade unions, chambers of commerce and the federal agency that oversees the schools, the process can drag, explained Thomas Speck, deputy federal chairman of the Federal Association of Vocational Education Teachers. It can take up to three years for new training regulations to be fully implemented after they’ve been recommended. 

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Making matters more complicated for teachers, classrooms look very different now than they did several decades ago. There are no formal requirements for enrolling in a vocational school, and more and more students are coming in with high school diplomas or even university degrees. That both raises the average age and widens the knowledge gap within classrooms. An increase in non-native German speakers also makes it harder to design courses that accommodate all students. In Jannes’ class, one student studied math at a university level while others struggle with basic arithmetic.

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Instead of more qualified students elevating the standards, André, Jannes’ mentor, describes the situation as  a race to the bottom — which employers say is reflected in the poor quality of trainee applicants. Compared to his own experience at vocational school, André said, “they’ve lowered the standards considerably, I’ve noticed.”

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Jannes’ school in Brandenburg, like many others, is understaffed and overwhelmed, and conditions vary from classroom to classroom. He described being taken aback by the behavior of his fellow classmates, who he said were shouting right-wing slogans and greeting each other with the Hitler salute. Andreas, the vocational teacher, lamented that “it is not possible to give all students the attention they need” — even though his school is well-equipped and well-staffed.  

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Jannes was lucky: he was able to switch into what he describes as a “model class” at the same school.

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To once again become a fast-track to skilled, in-demand jobs, experts like Fitzenberger and companies agree that the system needs a structural overhaul. And it has to become more attractive to would-be Azubis.