CCL Home > Newsroom > Speeches
It is a great pleasure to be here with you today, to talk about the state of learning, particularly in the workplace. It is an issue of paramount importance to Canada—equal parts challenge and opportunity.
But first, I would like to tell you a bit about the Canadian Council on Learning.
The vision of the Council is to be a catalyst for lifelong learning in Canada. CCL was created, not as the brainwave of an academic or public servant sitting in isolation, but as the result of demand from Canadians, from all walks of life.
Aware of the need for their families, their regions, their country to acquire the tools for success, Canadians called for a national body that would report on the state of learning across the lifecycle—an independent organization that could identify effective approaches to learning and what can be done to improve learning during every phase of life.
During its brief existence, CCL has been doing just that. Like the great railways of the 19th century, CCL approaches learning as a unifying force for Canada in the 21st century.
And so we have rolled out a variety of new vehicles to deliver vital information about learning to educators, governments, learning advocates and the public.
Our Composite Learning Index, for example, is an innovative new tool to assess Canada’s performance across the full spectrum of learning—in school, in the home, the workplace and the community. Last month we released the first Canada-wide study on the state of post-secondary education, calling for a national approach to increase the effectiveness of this crucial sector.
And on Friday, we will release our first-ever report on the State of Learning in Canada, which examines our progress in learning, from early childhood through to the senior years.
Today I would like to tell you about some of our conclusions with respect to learning by adults, in and outside of the workplace.
And, regrettably, the news is not all good.
Indeed, if our destination is a culture of lifelong learning, we still have a long journey ahead.
Our increasingly globalized, knowledge-based, technology-driven economy is demanding highly skilled and knowledgeable workers at an unprecedented rate. Between 1991 and 2003, the number of “high-knowledge” businesses in Canada rose by 78%, while the number requiring unskilled workers shrank by 3%. It is estimated that, by 2013, two-thirds of all jobs will require some form of post-secondary education.
In the face of such burgeoning demand, Canada’s low fertility rate and the retirement of aging baby boomers will lead to serious labour shortages in the years ahead. Indeed, those shortages are already occurring today in many regions, trades and professions. And we already know that we can’t make up the entire shortfall through immigration.
One obvious solution is to ensure that every individual in Canada has the opportunity to develop to his or her full potential.
First, let me provide a brief overview of Canada’s learning landscape.
Canadian teens score among the top industrialized nations in reading, math and problem solving in international tests, and the proportion of youth who quit high school before graduating is at a record low.
And yet, our drop-out rate remains high compared to many other developed countries.
We also know that Canadian adults are better educated than ever before. Our workforce has the world’s third-highest proportion of people with post-secondary education.
But, at the same time, the ugly truth is that 9 million adults in Canada do not have the level of literacy required for today’s labour market. That represents more than 40 percent of the working-age population.
The level of literacy is even lower among Aboriginal people, immigrants, older citizens, and people on social assistance. And, lest you think those statistics are an aberration, the numbers did not change on two major tests of more than 20,000 Canadians conducted 10 years apart.
In our forthcoming State of Learning in Canada report, we took a good look at what is happening in the Canadian workplace today. Are people getting a chance to make up for their inadequate literacy skills? What about workers who have the basics, but are looking to upgrade their skills and knowledge? And older workers, whose skills may have dulled a bit over the years?
Are all these people getting the learning opportunities they need?
The short answer is “No.”
Only 25% of workers across Canada receive training sponsored by their employers—a proportion that has changed little in years.
The statistics also tell us that those who need training the most are least likely to receive it. That includes people with low literacy skills, older workers and immigrants.
To put it in perspective: of all the workers getting training, only a small share—18%—have a high-school education or less. By contrast, more than half of those receiving training—52%— already have a university degree.
Yes, some workers decline to take training, mainly for reasons of cost, or a shortage of time.
But the fact is, that nearly three in 10 workers say they want to get further training, though it may not be offered to them. That translates into 1.5 million Canadians with unmet training needs.
We know there is a real appetite for more training because more and more, employees are opting to take courses on their own time, financed from their own bank account.
So why isn’t more training available?
According to the research, some organizations aren’t sure what the best approaches to training might be. Others, particularly smaller organizations find it difficult to afford the time and money associated with sending their people for training. Training is much more available in larger organizations.
Some doubt the return on investment, and others may fear losing employees who have benefitted from training.
Those reservations may be understandable, but they are misplaced.
Consider the findings of a survey on attitudes toward learning released by the Council in October. The two most common reasons workers give for wanting more training are to learn new things and to improve their on-the-job performance. About 70% say so—more than twice the number who hope that training will result in higher wages, or a better job elsewhere.
In other words, workers themselves feel they would be more valuable to their employers.
And the data certainly bear them out.
In fact, OECD studies have concluded that, when it comes to a company’s long-term productivity, investment in human capital brings three times the rate of return associated with capital investment.
Skilled staff enhance competitiveness by introducing innovation in technology, processes and corporate organization. There’s also the issue of corporate memory and experience: it makes sense to invest in older workers, especially now that labour market demand outpaces the supply of younger workers.
Furthermore, better-educated workers tend to be healthier, and more likely to comply with safety rules. That translates into lower costs due to illness, injury and absenteeism for the employer.
The OECD has calculated that even a 1% increase in something as basic as literacy scores can result in a 2.5% boost in labour productivity and a 1.5% increase in per-capita GDP.
Let’s take a look at what employers in other parts of the world are doing.
In the U.S., about 45% of adults took job-related education or training during 2003, compared to less than 30% of Canadian adults in 2002. In fact, almost all OECD countries now do better than Canada.
The U.K., Sweden, Ireland, Holland and most other industrialized nations have also increased their investment in adults skills, including measures to enhance literacy and numeracy.
Norway, for instance, instituted an innovative new apprenticeship scheme that has improved the supply of trained workers, while dramatically cutting the high-school dropout rate.
Under the program, students can participate in two-year apprenticeships after just two years of high school, and the government subsidizes their wages. The concept of apprenticeship was also extended to white-collar professions and service industries. Just three years after the reforms were put in place, 97 per cent of former dropouts were either back in school, in the labour force, or engaged in some sort of training program.
In the United Kingdom, the Adult Learning Inspectorate offers an interesting model. This independent public body monitors and reports on the quality of education and training that is offered in the private sector, NGOs, public sector institutions and training agencies. It also offers employers specific recommendations on how to improve the effectiveness of their approach to training.
Australia, the UK and 30 other European countries have established national goals and benchmarks for post-secondary education, especially in relation to student employability and their eventual impact on economic innovation, productivity and economic growth.
When it comes to adult learning and workplace training, the challenges are manifold and complex. And so too are the solutions.
This means that the responsibility cannot be borne by a single sector alone. All the evidence shows that governments, educational institutions, industry, NGOs and individuals have to see this as a collective responsibility—and work together toward a solution.
The post-secondary sector has traditionally been geared toward younger learners. That will not change. But as our population ages, it needs to do more: community colleges in particular need to work more closely with employers to find flexible and responsive ways to deliver education and training to older working adults.
Within industry, we are seeing innovative programs such as CARS—the Canadian Automotive Repair and Service program. This is an interactive, televised distance learning program to help licensed mechanics stay up to date with the latest developments in their field—at a time convenient to them and their bosses.
There is vast scope for more programs of this sort. A study commissioned by the Council suggested a “toolbox” of approaches to give employers the flexibility to address their own particular needs.
Among those tools are training tax credits for employers, training funds with matching contributions from government and the private sector, and the elimination of disincentives that discourage companies from adopting high-skill technologies.
There could also be a mechanism for government, employers and workers to share in the cost of paid training leave, as well as mechanisms to pool training resources and expertise for the benefit of small and medium-sized enterprises.
The Canadian Council on Learning plays an important role by gathering the data and generating the knowledge necessary to ensure our country is heading in the right direction.
CCL’s knowledge centres for work and learning, adult learning and Aboriginal learning are collaborating with experts from across Canada in the areas of labour, business, research, government and education to address many of the issues I have talked about today.
For example, we are exploring how to improve the transition from school to work and examining how to improve access to training by under-represented groups. We are also looking at barriers to adult learning and measures to assess the quality and effectiveness of workplace learning practices.
In another important initiative, we are gathering information on effective practices, so that employers, employees, labour unions, educators and policy makers can learn from the experiences of others.
Many of you have your hands full running a business, day in and day out. And while you may fully believe in the benefits of adult learning and workplace training, the business case may not yet strike you as compelling.
But the evidence is clear: an investment in workplace training will pay off, many times over, in terms of productivity, the capacity for innovation and overall competitiveness.
And, in addition to the advantages for your organization, adult learning and workplace training also bring immense benefits to the individual learner, the economy and the society at large.
Which means we all have an interest in ensuring adults get the learning and training they want and need.
And yet, by international standards, we’re not delivering.
It is time that we did.
Top