South Auckland youth get more training opportunities

South Auckland young people are gaining from boosts to three different work-training schemes.

Employment and Social Development Minister Steve Maharey today announced a doubling from next year in the number of Gateway schools, giving students a head start into work.

Mangere MP Taito Phillip Field says this will see De La Salle College, Southern Cross Senior School, Te Kura Kaupapa o Mangere, and Edgewater College join Sir Edmund Hillary Collegiate Senior School, Mangere, Tangaroa and Otahuhu Colleges, and Penrose, James Cook, and Papatoetoe High Schools, plus more than 200 other schools nationwide in the Gateway programme.

Gateway puts students from forms 4-7 into work environments such as restaurants, factories or farms. The skills they learn can count for credit in later training or apprenticeships.

Mr Field says Gateway is part of the government's plan for every 15-19 year-old to be in school, work or training by 2007.

"The Modern Apprenticeship scheme is also going from strength to strength. I'm pleased to announce that the latest figures to June 30 show 187 Modern Apprentices in the areas covered by Manukau City councils. That's up from September last year, when there were 128. There are now 5,739 in the country as a whole."

Mr Field said that the Government also actively encourages people to enter schemes run by industry training organisations.

In the wider Auckland there were 19,298 industry trainees at the end of June, including 3,628 in the area covered by Manukau City Council.

The most popular training categories in South Auckland are Engineering, Food & Manufacturing (with almost a thousand trainees), followed by Electrotechnology, Forestry, clothing, textiles, and the motor trade in the top slots. Across New Zealand there were 86,337 industry trainees at 30 June 2003, up 10 percent on the 78,240 at 30 June 2002, and substantially more than the 49,577 in industry training at June 1999.

"Workplace training sets you up for sustainable job opportunities because employers everywhere need trained people ready and able to do the job."

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