Practice-oriented insights into vocational training at ETH Zurich
Coming to ETH, but not for academic studies — there are many exciting apprenticeships at ETH Zurich. Interested youngsters had an opportunity to get a personal impression of the vocational-training programme at ETH.
Visit job-information centres (Photos: ETH Zurich/D-PHYS Heidi Hostettler)
In academic research, knowledge is often acquired through elaborate lab experiments. Researchers at ETH, and in the Department of Physics in particular, are working on specialised measurements that can take a long time to complete. Such experiments are only possible with home-built devices and set-ups.
The researchers get support from the department's workshops, support teams and construction offices. Here, specialists in the fields of electronics, polymechanics and informatics as well as physics-lab technicians work on equipment used in these experiments.
To ensure that these positions can be filled with qualified people also in the future, ETH is committed to vocational training. Each year in January, young people interested in the training programmes are offered an insight into the different vocational areas. Not only in physics, but also in chemistry and biology do laboratory workers provide valuable support to the researchers.
Various job-information centres (Berufsinformationszentren) refer the youngsters directly to Fabienne Jaquet, Human Resources at ETH Zurich. Depending on the profession, instructors and current apprentices provide practice-oriented insights into their vocational-training programme for up to 20 people. "A great presentation and good team spirit of the physics-lab technicians", a participant wrote by e-mail. She had learned a lot during the visit. This year, visits to the Department of Physics took place on 18 and 24 January.