Important to know what high school programs which increases the risk of unemployment

the President of the Teachers ' association of sweden, Åsa Fahlén, writes that we should pay attention to the study - and vocational counsellor and she says that it is unfortunate that we use the concept of consumer information when we require a better basis to gymnasieväljarna.

We agree with happy in that career and guidance counsellors have an important role to fill. However, it is nothing new. The establishment of a special ”study - and career guidance in primary and secondary education” came with the bill that the minister of education, Ingvar Carlsson, presented to the soon 48 years ago, in march 1971.

Therefore, we want to maintain that gymnasieväljarna need better evidence.

We are also happy that it can be called consumer education on upper secondary importance for the world of work. Fahlén does not develop why she thinks the wording is unfortunate. A possible objection is that training should be seen as an investment rather than consumption. If it is Fahléns points, we can, as a compromise, to accept that the concept that can be used in the future is ”investeringsupplysning”.

Regardless of the choice of words needed facts to gymnasieväljarna. Of the database of the central Statistical Office developed on our behalf and that we will make available on the www.gymnasiekvalitet.se show that there are individual programs that perform very poorly:

• There are 152 programs at different schools in Sweden, where only three quarters, or an even smaller percentage of students have jobs ten years after graduation.

• It is the whole 999 program at the different schools where at least half of the students have been unemployed any time in the five years after high school.

And at the same time, other programs whose students do very well on the labour market:

• There are 486 programs where all the learners are employed, ten years after they left upper secondary school.

• There are some very good examples that industriprogrammen at SKF technical high school in Gothenburg and Volvogymnasiet in Skövde. The two notes with the lowest proportion who have been unemployed for ten years of all the industrial programme in Sweden. They are also above average in income for this program. Students from SKF-the high school had incomes at an average of 300.448 crowns ten years after school. The from Volvogymnasiet had an average 279.452 sek in income.

as far As we know, the study - and vocational counsellor was not previously aware of these data on the individual programs at individual schools. For that they should be able to give informed advice to gymnasieväljarna needed hard facts. They are to be found on the www.gymnasiekvalitet.se.