What can you build on top of the apprenticeship certificate?

Many think a vocational education is a dead end where you just end up as a skilled worker. The truth is the opposite. A journeyman's certificate in electronics gives you a solid practical foundation and on top of that you can build a range of higher education. You can continue until you reach exactly the level you want.

The most obvious next step is a business academy degree. It's shorter than a university degree and builds directly on what you already know practically. For an electrician, directions like IT technologist and automation technician are close to the trade and a natural continuation.

• 01IT technologist – networks, hardware and systems close to electronics
• 02Automation Technologist — Control, Robots and Automatic Systems
• 03Other technical academy educations, depending on where you want to go

If you want to go further, you can take a professional bachelor's degree. Machine master is a classical path for technical skilled workers because it combines technique, operations and management — and it opens many doors in industry and energy. There are also other professional bachelors that build on a technical background.

For the one who wants to go all the way there are pathways from a technical background further towards engineering educations. This typically requires that you have or supplement with the right upper secondary subjects — and here the eux-path is an advantage because you already have some of the subjects that are needed.

You don't need to leave the job market to improve yourself. With work experience you can take academy education part-time and there are follow-up courses where you keep up to date on new technology. It is the flexible way: you become smarter while you earn.

Further education is not just about moving upward into management and theory. You can also become even sharper in the profession itself — specialize in particular equipment, an industry or a technique, and become the person colleagues come to when something is really difficult. That too is a career worth being proud of.

“Your journeyman certificate is not the ceiling — it's the floor you build the rest of your career on.”