Mcast has over 1,100 students registered as apprentices, a scheme it took over from the Employment and Training Corporation just over a year ago – but it is already planning to extend the scheme to higher vocational levels.
Silvio De Bono, the president of Mcast’s board of governors, said the current scheme covers levels three and four – students at Mcast Technical College – but will now be extended to internships at levels five and six, following degree programmes at Mcast University College.
“Next year we will add students at level seven – the masters programme,” he said.
Mcast reported at a recent conference that there were 710 apprenticeship vacancies in various sectors.
The adoption of the apprenticeship scheme is one of the three main pillars of the three-year strategic programme outlined by the new board, with another important milestone being the development of all the courses in-house, with Mcast as a self-accrediting institution.
When Mcast was set up, it offered both local and foreign programmes such as BTec and, although 3,203 of 6,505 students registered for foreign awarding bodies in 2014/15, 129 courses offered were developed internally out of the 183 courses offered that year.
The third development will be to offer students cross-curricular activity as from next year.
It is becoming a problem to recruit students in agriculture, woodwork, tile laying, masonry, ironwork and so on. Industry is not attractive any more
“Students could, for example, major in agriculture but minor in business, or major in design and minor in IT,” he said.
Dr De Bono is clearly satisfied at having been able to deliver on the plan but there are still worrying trends, he warned.
“It is becoming a problem to recruit students in agriculture, woodwork, tile laying, masonry, ironwork and so on. Industry is not attractive any more. I believe that this might be due to parents’ influencing their children to consider other areas but even though we are moving towards a service industry, it doesn’t mean that we do not need skills in the manufacturing industry,” he said.
Another concern is the skills gap, which he see as being down to the poor retention of students after level four: only a quarter of students graduate at levels five or six.
The board of governors is currently working on the next three-year plan and is also expected to announce that it broke even in 2015 – after inheriting a deficit of €1.1 million – with its Mcast Gateway to Industry subsidiary, set up in 2008, generating surplus funds which will be used to kill off the accumulated debt of the past years.
MCAST by numbers – 2014/15
3,413 - New students applying
237 - Foreign students, from 49 countries
183 - Courses offered by the 10 institutes
17 - New courses introduced
54 - Percentage that graduate at levels three or four
33 - Students who entered at level two among the 283 who graduated at level six