Abstract
Occupational prestige, the hierarchical perception of occupations, is a neglected issue in studies on vocational education and training, although the attractiveness of apprenticeship programs is strongly affected by their prestige. Based on a qualitative study, this article examines the identity strategies of apprentices whose training programs lack prestige. It understands not only identity but also prestige as dynamically and relationally constructed in everyday life and thus empirically contributes to contemporary theoretical debates about occupational prestige. It compares two occupations - bricklaying, which requires lower/medium skills, and automation technology, which requires higher skills - and shows that both are faced with a lack of prestige, although unequally, thus leading the apprentices to employ different strategies to valorize and engage with the training. These strategies draw on the meaning that the apprentices find in their work, the advanced skills the training requires, the variety of work tasks involved and the career possibilities the occupations provide. The results demonstrate that the apprentices are confronted with a vocational-academic divide that exists in many countries. This divide poses a threat to apprentices' identities, and their strategies aim to either maintain or reverse it. Although the prestige of apprenticeships is related to objective differences between both educational tracks and occupations, social actors can negotiate superiority and inferiority. Thus, the article also provides some practical recommendations for how apprentices confronted with a lack of social recognition can be encouraged to continue engaging with their training.
Highlights
Education policies in Switzerland strongly rely on vocational education and training (VET) because of its potential to integrate young people into the labor market (Korber and Oesch 2016)
This study with bricklaying and automation technology apprentices provides nuance to the simplified, positive picture of the Swiss VET system often offered by the media and politics
These young people face the academic-vocational divide that informs the prestige of their apprenticeships, resulting in a lack of recognition of and threat to their occupational identities
Summary
Education policies in Switzerland strongly rely on vocational education and training (VET) because of its potential to integrate young people into the labor market (Korber and Oesch 2016). In order to address the relative valuation of occupations, the article compares bricklaying, which according to the official body regulating VET in Switzerland requires medium-level skills, and automation technology, which requires advanced skills Apprentices of both occupations are concerned with a lack of occupational prestige, unequally, leading to different identity strategies to valorize and engage with their training. Individuals continuously construct, in interaction with others, their self in workplace settings and make meaning out of their ongoing work experiences (Zittoun 2016) They neither seamlessly adopt the occupational identity transmitted from inside the work community nor integrate societal perceptions of the occupational prestige accorded to their apprenticeship (Colley et al 2003). These contracts regulate salaries and benefits, working hours and even retirement age, which can have an impact on bricklayers’ occupational prestige and identity
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