Canada's Top Employers for Young People (2026) Magazine - Magazine - Page 4
4
MICHELIN
CANADA’S TOP EMPLOYERS FOR YOUNG PEOPLE (2026)
p Michelin North America (Canada) offers two technical scholarship programs to help young people enter skilled trade work, which include a $3,700 per year
scholarship at Nova Scotia Community College, paid summer work and formalized training at the company’s tire factories, valued at a total of $17,000.
Upskilling Young Canadians
Top Employers are providing their own training to combat the skilled worker shortage
S
o here’s the problem. For the
past decade or more, Canada
has experienced a significant
shortage of skilled young
workers who can handle all
manner of tasks that don’t require a
university education. From health care to
construction to manufacturing, a mass of
retirements – an estimated 700,000 people
over the current decade up to 2028 – are
fuelling the shortage, along with a lack of
replacements in the pipeline.
“From a young person’s perspective,
getting into industry can be quite
difficult,” says Cypress Weston, assistant
editor at Mediacorp Canada, which runs
the Canada’s Top Employers for Young People
(2026) competition. “There are lots of costs
related to equipment, certification and
schooling, and what we’re seeing from
many of our Top Employers is that they’re
offering support directly related to that.
They’re offering tuition support, they’re
providing the fees needed to become
certified, and they’re offering training.”
Ethel Baillie is part of that solution.
As AP school manager and technical
wage recruiter for Michelin North
America (Canada) Inc. in New Glasgow,
N.S., she runs the Michelin Technical
Scholarship program which offers young
people a major opportunity to get into
skilled trade work, focusing on maintaining equipment at the Michelin tire factory.
Offered to students enrolled in a two-year
program, it includes a $3,700 per year
scholarship at Nova Scotia Community
College (NSCC) and paid summer work
and training at the factory, valued at a total
of $17,000. A one-year electrical program
has just been added.
“Why we do it is, one, to promote skilled
trades, because there’s a shortage,” says
Baillie. “And two, the financial gain to the
students and the experience helps to set
them up for their career, either with
Michelin or for another industry after they
graduate. So for us, it’s a way to potentially
increase our employee offering, but a
benefit for them as well.”
Among her current students are three
who seem like a cross-section of the
Canadian labour market among young
men, people Weston notes are less likely
than women to graduate university. Nova
Scotia-born Charles Delaney went to
university for a while but found “the
environment wasn’t really for me.” Simon
Tracy, also local, went to university but
during the pandemic – “Three years of
sitting in my basement with 14-hour days.
It wasn’t fun, and at the end of it I had no
practical skills and couldn’t find a job.”
Bunyamin Gecer came from his native
Turkey for the NSCC program and learned
of the Michelin scholarship, which
promised to cover the costs in his goal of
electronics.
After completing the two-year program,
says Baillie, all three were hired for
full-time employment at Michelin, where
they will continue specialized training. But
she notes, “There’s no obligation for the
student to come to work for us. We just
hope that they do.”
– Berton Woodward
