Energy Capacity Initiative Project

Grant Report

PROMOTING OF TRAINING PROGRAM INTRODUCTION TO ENERGY MANAGEMENT AND POLICY

Grant Agreement No. ECI-GA-R2-54

USAID Contractor: Advanced Engineering Associates International, Inc. Beneficiary: Association of Young Professionals in Energy of Georgia (AYPEG)

24 June 2011

Table of Content

1. Project Synopsis---------------------------------------------------------------------------3

2. Summary of project progress since the start of the project --------------------4

3. Project progress in final project period----------------------------------------------5

4. Discrepancy between planned and achieved activities--------------------------6

5. Evaluation of the training---------------------------------------------------------------8

6. Lessons learnt and recommendations----------------------------------------------10

1. Project Synopsis
The aim of the project was to bring together from one side professional academic trainers, and from the other side available and potential workforce in energy sector. From a wide perspective, the project was intended to deal with the lack of collaboration among universities and energy companies. The goal was to enhance implementation of institutional framework, where academic sector, in this case the Center of Excellence for Energy (CEE), transform its academic knowledge into practical training courses which will be beneficial for the companies. During its progress, the project also tried to make first step for implementation professional training courses in this field, namely to introduce unprecedented for Georgian reality Continuing Education Unit (CEU) system which is applied mechanism, which gives opportunity to an individual involved in energy sector to gain non-credit educational and carrier enhancement experience. Unfortunately this particular goal was not achieved. CEU was not established. However, project was still very successful. Instead of expected 30 trainees, the program attracted 52 people including 18 students, 22 workers from 5 companies (ESCO, GNERWC, TELASI, GSE, Energo-Pro Georgia) in energy sector of Georgia and 12 participants from other companies. In other words, the project was able to fulfill its main goal: to bring together from one side professional academic trainers and from the other side available and potential workforce in energy sector and to help the collaboration among universities and energy companies.

2. Summary of project progress since the start of the project

The primary responsibility of AYPEG was to plan, promote and organize the training program in Introduction to Energy Management & Policy and the related workshops. First of all, AYPEG got familiar with the training material and identified the target groups and the number of potential trainees. The expectation was to attract totally 30 participants from the four primary target groups: 1. Students pursuing the graduate programs in energy; 2. High school science teachers; 3. Energy-sector professionals; 4. Journalists and any other interested professionals. Next step was to work with the target groups in order to promote the training program and attract the potential trainees. For this goal AYPEG performed several activities like placing the announcements on 4 different websites (www.jobs.ge, www.hr.com.ge, www.edu-guide.ge and www.edu.aris.ge) and designing, printing and spreading the flyers. Moreover, AYPEG prepared and carried out the presentations in following universities and energy sector companies: Electricity System Commercial Operator (ESCO), Georgian State Electro System (GSE), electricity distribution companies Telasi and Energo-Pro Georgia, KazTransGaz Tbilisi, Georgian National Energy and Water Supply Regulatory Commission, Georgian Industrial Group (GIG), Grigol Robakidze University, Georgian Technical University (GTU), International School of Economics an TSU (ISET), Akaki Tsereteli State University. All these steps were finished by the end of the April and AYPEG started to register the trainees. Though originally it was expected to attract 30 people, the active and intensive promotion resulted in an interest shown by more than 60 people from which, finally, 52 actually registered themselves: 18 students 7 TELASI workers 7 GSE workers
4

 3 GNERWC workers 3 ESCO workers 2 Energo-Pro Georgia workers 12 other professionals

Distribution of 52 participants

23% 35% 4% 6% 6% 13% 13%

Student JSC Telasi GSE GNEWRC ESCO

3. Project progress in final project period

Due to the increased number of the applicants the AEAI office in Tbilisi was not able to host the training. Instead, the AYPEG negotiated with the ISET administration who generously allowed the association to use the ISET Conference Hall for the training for free. The training itself held each Friday and Saturday from the May 20 till June 17. The following modules were offered to the trainees: a) Module 1: Basics in Energy Engineering (6 hours); b) Module 2: Demand-Side Management (6 hours); c) Module 3: Energy-Sector Organizations and Energy Policy-Making Process in Georgia (6 hours);
5

d) Practical workshop at the laboratory of the Schneider Electric, Georgian Technical University (2 hours) AYPEG did not manage to develop the e-learning system. Instead, the books covering the training material have been printed and provided to the audience. All the other studying materials were sent by e-mails to the participants. By the end of the program AYPEG designed and printed the certificates which were awarded at Sheraton Metechi Palace (instead of the originally planned ISET Conference Hall) organized by ECI project.

4. Discrepancy between planned and achieved activities

This section summarizes all the discrepancy from the initial plan of the project and provides explanation to the causes of above mentioned differences. The major goal of the project to bring together from one side professional academic trainers and from the other side available and potential workforce of energy sector was achieved. However there were some deviations which in principle did not affect the achievement of the major goal, but still are worth of considering and analyzing. 1. Planned: Totally 30 participants were expected to attend the training course. Achieved: The number of participants was approximately twice as much as it was planned. Totally 52 trainees accomplished the full course and were awarded with the certificates. Reasons and Explanations: The main driving force that caused oversupply of applicants was well organized promotion campaigned by AYPEG team and low training fee. The latter reason is quite clear, since the training fee was reflecting only 20-25% of total cost of the course. Consequently, increased number of trainees caused to change location of the training and it held at ISET conference hall instead of ECI project office. 2. Planned: The training in Introduction to energy management and policy consisted of 20 academic hours with following division of modules: a) Module 1: Introduction to Energy Terminologies and Technologies (5 hours); b) Module 2: Demand-Side Management (5 hours);
6

c) Module 3: Energy-Sector Organizations and Energy Policy-Making Process in Georgia (10 hours); Achieved: Composition of training was changed. In addition to 3 Modules, 2 hours of practical workshops was provided at the Georgian Technical University. Accordingly, the training was delivered under the name Introduction in Energy Engineering and Policy, the schedule was the following: 4. Module 1: Basics in Energy Engineering (6 hours); 5. Module 2: Demand-Side Management (6 hours); 6. Module 3: Energy-Sector Organizations and Energy Policy-Making Process in Georgia (6 hours); 7. Practical workshop at the laboratory of the Schneider Electric, Georgian Technical University (2 hours) Reasons and Explanations: By the decision of the Center of Excellence in Energy, all three participant universities divided equally lengths of module. In order to give also some practical knowledge to trainees, the practical workshop was delivered as well. 3. Planned: The trainees should be awarded by CEU credits (2 CEU for this training). Achieved: The trainees were awarded only by certificates indicating attendance on the lectures. They were not accomplished by CEU credits. Reasons and Explanations: The CEE did not managed to develop medium-long term strategy of CEU implementing and accomplishment. Because CEU is the mechanism that requires collaboration between universities and companies, AYPEG was not responsible to accomplish CEU credits. Furthermore, companies neglected to recognize CEU credits for the introductory trainings in Energy. However, companies expressed their will to recognize CEU credits if trainings were on advanced topics in energy, especially in new technologies. To provide training on the latter is the main obstacle for the Georgian Universities. 4. Planned: major part of the project was to promote the training course.

Achieved: besides promotional and organizational parts, the responsibility of AYPEG extended including managing training fees in terms of covering the costs of trainers and other activities Reasons and Explanations: It appeared to be more convenient to carry out all the transactional and financial activities by the one organization and the most appropriate choice was AYPEG.

5. Evaluation of the training

The evaluation of the training is the most important information that could be used as an assessment of the trainings and also to identify needs for the future training programs. Evaluation of the training was done in two directions. At the end of the training program, trainees filled the special evaluation form in order to found out the feedback about the each module, trainers and the training program as a whole. In general, the evaluation showed significantly high and positive feedbacks in all questions. The questions included in the evaluation form were: How was the content of the course? How did you like the style of presentation? Where did you hear about our course? and etc. Main results from the evaluation are the following:

Table 1 describes the average Evaluation of Trainers. Participants have evaluated the trainers from 1 to 5, where one indicates the worst and five indicates the best performance. From the feedback of course participants we have found that most of them have heard about the training from the presentations (40 %) and from the staff of his company (31 %). The rest of them found information in internet and from friends.

Participiants
From Presentation From Job From Friend From Internet

26% 40% 3% 31%

On the question "Which module did you like most?" the participants answered the following: Module 1: Basics of energy - 37%; Module2: Demand-side management of energy - 37%; Module 3: Organizations in energy sector and energy policy-making process in Georgia -28%. The most of the participants does not would like to exclude anything from the course. Most members of the course believed that the level of administration was high and training time was optimal. Some of them desired to even increase the time and topics of the training. In general, comments are quite positive and considerable. Finally, evaluation of the each module and the course is described in the Table 2. Numbers in the table indicate average.
Module 1: Basics of energy 4,79 Module2: Demand-side management of energy 4,84 Module 3: Organizations in energy sector and energy policy-making process in Georgia 4,44 Evaluation of Course 4,57

Table 2 Besides the evaluation from the trainees, AYPEG members were also attending to the lectures and monitoring process of the training. They not only deepen their knowledge but also provide valuable feedback about the academic and administrative challenges of the training program.
9

Apart of that, during the breaks all trainees and AYPEG members were actively involved in the discussions which also helped us to determine their needs and interests for the future. All these steps give us possibility to draw suggestion and conclusions.

5. Suggestions and Recommendations

Project Promoting of training program Introduction to Energy management & Policy has revealed that there is an interest from society of the trainings in energy sector. Only the fact that both, trainees that represented several energy companies and also students and some disqualified participants in energy expressed to participate again in training courses indicate that there is demand on the trainings in energy field. However it is important to split the groups of trainees into the professionals in energy field and beginners. The reason is that some participants, especially from GNEWRC, were overqualified for the energy basics training, while it was new and beneficial for the beginners and students. More advanced topics should be offered to the professionals, and more intensive course should be delivered for the beginners and the students. As representatives of the energy organization mentioned, they would prefer attend the lecture provided by the professionals employed in energy organization. For instance, they suggested that module on energy policy should be delivered by the trainer from the Ministry of Energy and Natural Resources of Georgia. Implementing training courses in new, modern technologies (like SCADA systems) was another suggestion. Finally AYPEGs position is that lecturers from the CEE are capable to read more advanced topics as successfully as they did in basic energy parts but additionally it is necessary to invite also professional trainer that works in energy company/organization and has practical experience. In sum the overall evaluation of the project was successful and brought benefits to trainees, trainers and AYPEG. More qualified applicants updated there professional knowledge, while students and beginners got familiar to energy technologies, energy demand-side management and energy policy. Trainers gained also, especially when the interactive part of the trainings, very often it addressed to discussions of advanced topics in Energy between lecturer and trainees from the energy organizations. And lastly, AYPEG gained from practical experience
10

completing successfully its first project, established necessary professional contacts with energy organizations and companies, and formed crucial information about training needs, topics and necessities. AYPEG is grateful to the USAID energy capacity initiative project, for financing the project, providing necessary consultations and administrative support and is willing to continue further collaboration with USAID.

11