(CZ) Sociálno-profesionálna orientácia detí a mládeže na robotnícke povolania
(EN) Socio-Professional Orientation of Children and Youth on Blue-Collar Occupations

In this study the integration of the system of preparing young people for blue-collar occupations into the general educational system of the Czecnoslovak Socialist Republic, the setting up of secondary vocational training centres, is judgea from the viewpoint of promoting the leading role of the working class in the socialist society: conditions are being created for further qualitative socio-cultural development of future members of the working class and for an increase in the number of young people from working class families applying for admission to universities and other higher education institutions.
The analysis of the results of a sociological research regarding apprentices in Slovakia in 1978 has shown that there is a relatively weak identification of apprentices with their training centre. A high orientation on secondary vocational schools is to be found especially among those apprentices who decided to enter their vocational training centre only after having failed in their secondary school entrance examinations (17.5 per cent). This group of apprentices also includes the greatest number of those who, after completing their training at the vocational training centre, intend to continue their education at a higher type of school.
Young people who are preparing for blue-collar occupations at vocational training centres regard the secondary vocational school leaver as a more attractive model of personal self-realisation. They attribute to him such assets as higher wages, better chances of promotion, more leisure time, a more stable future, greater social respect and appreciation, possibilities of perfecting one’s skills. At the same time, however, the prestige of preparation for the G. C. E. at secondary vocational training centres is on the increase, especially among apprentices in the engineering industry. Present-day apprentices link the G. C. E. at a secondary vocational training centre with such values as: social significance of work, utilisation of abilities and skills, creative work.