Not educated enough to work in a supermarket?????

[anotheoldgit]

http://www.telegraph....n-school-leavers.html

Credit due to Morrison's for sending these youngsters back for "remedial pre-job training" before they start work, but who is to blame for this shocking state of affairs?

Is it the education system, is it the teachers, is it their parents, or just the teenagers themselves?

[jno]

I'm not sure that "turning up on time and making eye contact" is something you learn at school.

[jomifl]

It's the parents, they supply the genes and the upbringing, you can't blame anyone else.

[Mosaic]

Ask any teenager what they did at school last Friday.
'Nuffin'.
So supermarket managers get the same treatment.
So the yout' gets time off in training for which dey is paid, man.
And we think kids are daft....

[237SJ]

"They lacked a lot of confidence and social skills" - I would say that rather than being let down the the education system, they have been let down by Facebook, mobile phones and computer games. I would think a lack of social skills is going to be more and more common as kids learn only to communicate electronically.

[dave1948]

Undoubtedly the teenagers. If ten years education can't give them the skills needed to stack shelves etc then I can't see how Morrisons can do things on remedial pre-job training. Mind you unlike schools Morrisons can get rid of them easily if they don't toe the line

[Mosaic]

Tell you what though - round Ordsall they'd be dead handy if you'd locked yourself out of your car. Call the AA? Nah, fetch Lee - 2 minutes and he'll be in.

[anotheoldgit]

RATTER15

/// Do you ever have anything positive to say? You are so depressing!!! ///

If you want idle chitter-chatter you are in the wrong section.

This is the News section, and the news these days is pretty depressing, so please 'Don't Shoot The Messenger.

[Gromit]

You pay peanuts, you get monkeys.

Youths in high unemployment areas such as Salford are forced to apply for many jobs they are not suitable for in order to get any unemployment benefit. They might be brilliant car mechanics or joiners, but there aren't enough of those jobs, so they get jobs they have no interest in for the wage.

[pilotlight]

Just wait until the next release of exam results.
As usual, it will be 'the best yet !! '.
Who's kidding who ?

[Messi_Ten]

It's grim up north!

[Nibble]

I'm not entirely surprised - many employers have been saying that school leavers don't have basic maths and English skills useful in the work environment, and to be honest, some people already on work don't either. We have to offer basic skills tests when people start courses such as NVQs, and sometimes the applicants still need support to reach the required standard - and they're already in jobs - they've just developed clever coping mechanisms to cover their knowledge shortfalls.

[maggiebee]

Was in quite a fancy restaurant yesterday where the special light bite was "Corriander and carrot soup and a sandwitch"

[birdie1971]

It's not just school leavers. I have met and worked with many graduates who are incapable of writing a simple letter or doing basic maths.

[birdie1971]

AOG - “Is it the education system, is it the teachers, is it their parents, or just the teenagers themselves?”

It's not the teenagers. Of that, I am sure. You'll always get some individuals who, for whatever reason, are going to be intellectually below the norm – this is to be expected and is true today just as it has been true in every generation that has been before. However, there is no conceivable way that in a few brief years we have given birth to a entire generation of youths that have taken an evolutionary step backwards and become significantly less intelligent than their forebears.

I don't think it's the teachers either. They work within a framework not renowned for its flexibility. The methods of teaching and the specifics of what they teach are all dictated to them from officials in government.

The problem is the eduction system as a whole, the parents and the society within which they are raised.

[naomi24]

I watched a discussion on education a couple of weeks ago, and according to the league tables, Britain, something like the sixth richest nation in the world, is at number twenty-six on the list for mathematics. (I think I have that right). Whilst parents (and society) must bear a good deal of responsibility for the lack of discipline our children are instilled with, the problems really began when government started to interfere with education (and the same applies to the National Health Service). When ministers acknowledge that their ideas aren't better than those of highly qualified educators things might change - but I wouldn't hold my breath because dumbing down within the education system has become the norm, not only for the student, but for the teacher too. What would once have been an unacceptable standard for a teaching qualification has now become acceptable, and the rot has set in.

[Snafu03]

A line from Pulps 'Common People' springs to mind; 'Pretend you never went to school'.

We have an excellent, free education system open to all in the UK. Unfortunately gaining anything from that is considered 'uncool' by the lower working classes.