Friday, 11th
July 2020
Where were
we at the beginning of the school year? Oh yes, that’s right. Joyfully oblivious
to what would happen when 2019 became 2020.
J was back
working in the bar by the end of October, after his work-related accident in
June 2019, and trying to find some direction, which he eventually did in
February. I will return to this later.
C was in
his last year of his apprenticeship, and therefore the last of his Berufschule
(“Profession School”) years. By some miracle he started to realise that if he
actually did some work for tests, he usually passed them, reasonably well. (How
old was he then? Yes, 18). I was still focussed on being home from work each
day to make sure that he actually did his homework (which was still,
frustratingly, going on in the main family room) but I knew that this school year
would require all manner of patience and tenacity. It wasn’t so much that he
needed to be babysat with the homework, but him knowing that I was home to be
aware that he was actually doing it. An awareness that we were supporting him
without trying to be controlling, if that makes sense. It was a lot of rote
learning, so he usually had some worksheets to scan that I then blocked out the
answers, reprinted and put into plastic sheets, so that he could practice and
repeat the answers. Yes, I know that’s ridiculous for an 18 year old, but I was
prepared to do nearly anything to support him getting through this year
successfully.
At
Berufschule generally students don’t really do traditional subjects, they do apprenticeship-specific
subjects, and as a Polymechaniker he was doing A Lot Of Technical Stuff. It’s A
Very Technical Apprenticeship, which can be used as a fantastic base to do all
sorts of things in the future. However, school hasn’t always been his thing,
and he wasn’t very happy about the trigonometry and maths, generally. As he
pointed out to me later in the year “Mum. Some of these subjects are actually
quite hard. And so are the tests”. Fair point, Boychild. He supplemented his
maths with the occasional foray onto Khan Academy, which seemed to help. Just
before Christmas, he sat the dreaded “Semesterschlusstest”, which was exams in
all his Berufschule subjects, to determine his 7th Semester grades
for his report card. And passed. And. Breathe. Part 1.
For his ABU
Grade in Semester 7, C had to produce a written extended essay - about 3,000
words, such a quantity of which he’s never had to write in DE before. Ever. ABU
is the abbreviation for Allgemeinbildenden Unterricht, which is basically
general studies, but covers such brilliant topics as “how to complete your tax
return” (essential for Swiss of all ages) and “the Swiss political system and how
to vote” (also essential knowledge for Swiss of all ages). They were given a
topic, which was “Risks” and he chose to write on the risks of journalism,
since he has a cousin who is a professional journalist in Iraq. They had a
clear rubric and structure, together with a couple of sessions looking at research
methods, and he made a plan to complete the work, which he stuck to. He was
pleased with the final product but also had to do a presentation on it to the
class, which he found harder, since public speaking is not his favourite thing.
But he got through all that fine, which was a relief. And. Breathe. Part 2.
And then 2019
became 2020 and along came COVID-19.
Switzerland
officially locked down at midnight on March 16th. OH and I came home
to work, which required a rapid remodelling of the spare room to organise a
dedicated workspace for OH. J was furloughed. C, however, continued to go to
work, and was fortunate enough to live close enough to use his bike, thereby
avoiding public transport. The rest of the staff in his factory went onto short
hours, but the apprentices didn’t. But let’s be honest, it’s a bit difficult to
work from home when your equipment takes up the space of several rooms and
weighs many tonnes. His Scouting activities all paused, but the local Musikschule
were fantastically efficient at delivering online instrumental lessons and band
rehearsal via Zoom almost immediately, which was great, and provided a little
more normalcy.
After a strange
couple of weeks, his Berufschule managed to get some online teaching sorted out,
and he was able to go to school from his bedroom. The entire class were never
all there, though, and I was shocked by the number of students never bothering
to login and register in class.
He had been
due to sit his mock final theoretical exams in March, but they were abandoned
by the school, which was actually a shame, as he could have benefitted from the
experience of sitting an exam to achieve something “real” and figure out where
he needed to improve.
Early in April
the Swiss Government announced that this year’s final year apprentices would
sit their practical exams (a bit of a misnomer, since most of them stand for a
living), but not their theory exams. Their theory marks for the apprenticeship
final would be based on an average of their previous semester grades over the
length of the apprenticeship. Disappointment about missing out on the sitting-a-real-exam-experience
quickly turned to relief when we realised that this meant he couldn’t now fail
the whole thing. And. Breathe. Part 3.
We then
spent weeks trying to get the dates of the practical exam from the Lehrmeister
at work, and eventually were told that this would “only” be 40 hours of exam, instead
of the possible 120 hours. 40 hours of practical! For a 19 year old! Anyway,
thankfully that all took place in May, with a presentation to an expert a
fortnight later about the week’s work and what he had had to make, and how he
had done it. However, in the middle of the 5-day-long practical exam, the
Berufschule did a U-turn about the theoretical exam, and decided to hold the
mock theory exam as the method of obtaining the Semester 8 theory marks. At 2
weeks’ notice.
C had a bit
of a meltdown and then pulled himself together when we pointed out to him that
he’d already done a lot of learning for the mock before it was originally cancelled.
So he sat the theory exam, and got the best grades he’s had, for his Semester 8
report card. Massive relief. And in the same week he heard that he had passed
his practical, though we didn’t get the overall grade for another 5 weeks. And.
Breathe. Part 4.
He did
manage to have a “Schulabschluss” (school leaving party) but neither parents
nor Lehrmeisters were invited. So at least he got to say goodbye to his
teachers and school friends. And he picked up his final report, which confirmed
that he had passed his apprenticeship with a decent mark. And. Breathe.
Deeply. Possibly even falling asleep.
The icing
on the cake? He has a job. A proper one, as a Polymechaniker at the factory
where he trained, in the next town. Which means he can work for a couple of
years, get some great work experience, and save for a couple of years while
deciding in which direction to go next.
What was
going on with J while all this happened? Well, C had had a morning at
Berufschule in January, where the final year apprenticeship students were
presented with the many and varied options to continue in their education. One
of these was to return to school, at “KME – Kantonale Maturitätschule für Erwachsene”
– or, as C described it, “Gymi for adults”. Yes, if a student has successfully completed
his/her apprenticeship and wants to then go for the academic route, they then
have the possibility to go back to school. Literally. And work to attain the
Swiss Federal Matura, thus then having a route to university. Whether or not
they need to pass an exam to get into this school depends on the type of their
apprenticeship and whether or not they have already done BMS (and their BMS
final grade). An open day was held at KME at the end of February, just before
lockdown, with both boys attending. J decided this was what he wanted, and
after applying and an interview, he was accepted. He was furloughed shortly
after this, so has had another 4 months off…….. but has been revising French,
Maths and Biology ready to start school again in August. He’s read Camus in the
original and has been practising Algebra. He’s not quite sharpened his pencils
yet, but one step at a time, eh.
It’s quite
normal to continue with part work and part education ad infinitum, it
seems. Where I am currently working there are several staff in their 20s who
work around 80% and are at college the other 20% – and this is years after the
apprenticeship stage.
So, a dozen
years after our first transition to Swiss education, have we reached our
destination? Not our final one, I don’t think. Both young men have the
essential bit of paper saying that they have completed the first official
further education, which means that other doors can now open, together with, at
the age of 21 and 19, 6 and 4 years’ respectively of actual proper work
experience. It’s been tough, at times, very, very tough. It’s not where we originally
thought they would be, and that’s OK, because we are so very proud of what they
have achieved. If anything, they have more paths open to them, having taken the
apprenticeship route, than if they had done gymi first time round, which only
fast tracks you to university and doesn’t offer other choices.
So, it is
finished; after all that breathing, I’m going for a little lie down.
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