Apprentices and trainees 2021: December quarter

THIS PUBLICATION HAS BEEN SUPERSEDED.

For the most recent release please see the Apprentices and trainees collection page.

Description

This publication provides a snapshot of apprenticeships and traineeships across Australia. It presents statistics on commencements, completions, cancellations and withdrawals and those currently in training. Unless stated otherwise, data are derived from the latest National Apprentice and Trainee Collection (no. 111, March 2022 estimates), which is compiled under the Australian Vocational Education and Training Management Information Statistical Standard (AVETMISS) for Apprentice and Trainee Collection Specifications, Release 7.0, October 2015.

Due to the delay in time between an event (commencement, completion, etc.) occurring and the reporting of that event to NCVER, NCVER estimates the most recent figures. The estimation method involves weighting recently processed numbers based on average reporting lags. As estimates are revised for up to seven quarters, figures for the last two years may differ from those published in earlier or in subsequent reports. The final counts are those submitted by jurisdictions. Further details on the methodology can be found in the Estimation of apprentice and trainee statistics technical paper.

Notes:

• The COVID-19 pandemic in Australia has created uncertain times for individuals, business and governments, which have affected apprentice and trainee numbers.  Care should be taken when comparing 2020 and 2021 data with data from previous years.

• In-training figures represent the number of apprenticeship and traineeship training contracts where the apprentice or trainee is actively training under the terms of their contract, and who have not completed, cancelled or withdrawn from their training, or had their training contract expired without meeting all of the prescribed requirements of their program. The figure reflects the number of active contracts at a given point in time (at the end of the quarter), and therefore in-training figures cannot be cumulated over time. For this reason, quarterly comparisons are equivalent to 12-months ending comparisons, as they both represent the changes as at 31 December from one year to the next.

Highlights

In-training as at 31 December 2021

There were 349 235 apprentices and trainees in-training as at 31 December 2021, an increase of 16.8% from 31 December 2020.

Quarterly training activity

In the December quarter 2021, compared with the December quarter 2020:

• commencements decreased by 32.2%, to 48 685
• completions increased by 20.2%, to 26 815
• cancellations and withdrawals increased by 42.8%, to 28 680

Training activity: 12-month ending series

In the 12 months ending 31 December 2021, compared with the 12 months ending 31 December 2020:

• commencements increased by 27.5%, to 216 445
• completions increased by 9.3%, to 83 055
• cancellations and withdrawals increased by 41.6%, to 102 870.

Report

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION

Note that the percentages presented in this product are reported to one decimal place. All other numbers, after aggregation, have been rounded to the nearest five. Rounding can lead to instances where the numbers in the body of a given table might not add to the rounded totals.

Unknown data have not been reported in any tables, whereas the total includes all contracts, including those with unknown status. Hence, some figures in the tables may not sum to the total.

As the vocations approved to be under an apprenticeship or traineeship training contract are not consistent across all jurisdictions, NCVER has adopted a Trade/Non-trade categorisation for the purpose of the National Apprentices and Trainees Collection with 'Trades' classified as all occupations listed under ANZSCO major group '3-Technicians and trades workers' and 'Non-trades' classified as all other major occupations groups 1-2 and 4-8 (ANZSCO, First edition, Revision 2). ANZSCO has been back-cast by NCVER to 1994 for reporting purposes. For further information on the methodology, see <https://www.ncver.edu.au/research-and-statistics/publications/all-publications/anzsco-imputation-in-the-national-apprentice-and-trainee-collection>.

In September 2016, NCVER implemented a number of collection and system changes and as such some activity may differ to that reported in previous publications. These changes included implementation of release 7.0 of the AVETMIS Standard for apprentices and trainees, and migration of the historical data collections to a new database.

For the latest detailed information please refer to the DataBuilder accessible from the Apprentices and trainees collection page. The DataBuilder allows users to quickly create customised tables using the latest Apprentice and trainee data, filter by a selection of variables and compare training activity over time. Users can view quarterly and annual data for commencements, completions, cancellations/ withdrawals and in-training.

This infographic is drawn from Australian vocational education and training statistics: apprentices and trainees 2021 — December quarter, NCVER, Adelaide.

SOURCE: National Centre for Vocational Education Research (NCVER), National Apprentice and Trainee collection no. 111, March 2022 estimates, Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS), Labour force, Australian, detailed, May 2021 (as at August 2021), cat. no. 6291.0.55.001.

© Commonwealth of Australia, 2022

For details and exceptions visit the NCVER Portal.

This work has been produced by NCVER on behalf of the Australian Government, and state and territory governments, with funding provided through the Australian Government Department of Employment and Workplace Relations.

The views and opinions expressed in this document are those of NCVER and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Australian Government or state and territory governments.

Published by NCVER, ABN 87 007 967 311

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