A Model for the Future: Building Bridges between School and Working-Life

At an official ceremony at the Maria Ward High School for Girls in Bamberg, Michael Stammberger, head of the Brose Group Apprentice Training Center, and the school’s head and director of studies, Ingrid Käfferlein, signed an agreement setting up a training partnership. Under this partnering agreement, female pupils from the 11th grade will be given detailed insights into work-based vocational university courses – with a special focus on engineering subjects – as well as career advice.

“There are excellent opportunities in engineering for young women with sound schooling. We’re aiming to draw the attention of qualified female students to the attractive career opportunities in a more technical environment and to raise the proportion of female applicants to our company in the medium term,” underscores Michael Stammberger, head of the Apprentice Training Center.

“During their stints of practical work experience, we show them that there is plenty of common ground between their schooling in languages and economic and social science subjects and the cooperative education courses that our company offers,” said Stammberger, in his address to the representatives of the school management, the parents’ association, the Archdiocese of Bamberg which runs the school, and the press, explaining the goal of the agreement.

An attractive way of combining theory and practice

The key elements of the partnership agreement are applicants’ days, a business information systems project and career guidance days. These events give the pupils an opportunity to visit and familiarize themselves with the company, while training supervisors
inform them about undergraduate industrial engineering courses leading to a Bachelor of Engineering degree and give them tips on how to apply. The girls will also have the opportunity of doing a practical project, the aim of which is to optimize a business process using their own ideas, and to present their solutions – which will be marked – to their class on the school's Internet site.

In addition, Brose offers practical work experience in the professions for which it offers training, as well as the chance to attend the Girls’ Day career guidance event and the “Girls for Engineering” camp. This will give the schoolgirls a chance to deepen their knowledge of technical subjects, especially mechatronics, electronics and mechanics. These events and activities are held at our training location in Hallstadt/Bamberg, with support from the company’s respective business departments .

With this partnership agreement, the school has a new and attractive means of combining theory and practice. “By offering these opportunities, we aim to foster our pupils’ different gifts as far as possible and to open up new prospects for them. I’m delighted that Brose, one of the largest companies in the region, is reaching out so actively to the next generation during their school education and
offering help on career decisions at an early stage. Three of our former pupils have already opted to train with Brose: They will be starting an industrial engineering course on October 1,” reports Käfferlein.

Partnership also includes information events for teachers

The training venture also provides for information events for teachers, who will be given an insight into Brose and the training
opportunities it offers through visits to the company and presentations. The training managers will also brief teachers on the different courses of study that are available in Germany. In addition, they will provide tips on applicant selection procedures and aptitude tests.

It is already planned to extend the partnership in school year 2010-2011, when the pupils will do project work on themes such as health, the world of labor and labor processes.

The Brose Group is currently training a total of 250 young people in eight business management and commercial/technical vocations at its German plants, as well as students in four different cooperative education programs. Some 200 of these are studying for an engineering career; just under one-fifth of these are women.