BP promotes engineering at Azerbaijan's high schools

(Baku Daily) - BP is supporting a new initiative aimed at promoting engineering disciplines at high schools.

The initiative brought together about 200 students from a selected group of high schools in Baku. These were high potential students from 8 to 10 grades, interested in technical subjects and selected through an initial application and screening process.

The initiative was fully supported by the Ministry of Education and was implemented by GencMIIB (the public union “Development of Young Engineers”), whose membership also includes many professional engineers from BP Azerbaijan.

As part of the initiative a series of workshops were held to help the students select their future career routes. The programme of the workshops presented a good opportunity for the participants to get extensive information from professional engineers about their experience and knowledge, as well as firsthand information about engineering opportunities in BP-operated projects in Azerbaijan.

The series of workshops started on 18 October and ended on 22 November 2014. The workshops were led by experienced engineers from BP and volunteering members of GencMIIB who donated their own time and efforts to make the project  a success. 

Hikmet Mammadli, Process Safety Engineer at BP and Project Manager at GencMIIB, said: “It is very encouraging to see so many bright high school students who are interested in engineering and are inspired to play a role in the future development of the country. 

“I believe this project will help us identify potential students with analytical thinking capabilities and encourage them to become engineers in the future”, commented Hikmet.

The programme of the workshops included presentations on engineering disciplines, career stories of experienced BP engineers, interactive simulation games, as well as psychological and ability tests specifically designed for the participants.

Special presentations were delivered by representatives of BP’s Human Resources department to inform the participants about BP’s educational and scholarship programmes.

 “This is a great initiative that brought together key parties to promote engineering disciplines at Baku’s high schools. These are the schools themselves, BP – in which there are excellent opportunities for engineering and other related disciplines, and professional engineers who can share their knowledge and expertise. I would like to take this opportunity to thank members of GencMIIB who volunteered to donate so much effort and time to make this initiative a real achievement”, said Aytan Karimova, Graduate/University Recruitment Lead at BP’s human resources department.

At the end of the programme all participants received certificates. Prizes were also presented to the most successful students.

BP as the operator of Azerbaijan’s major oil and gas development and transportation projects is committed to supporting the country’s capacity-building efforts including those aimed at developing strong local expertise in the oil and gas sector. As part of this commitment BP supports a wide range of  educational and youth development programmes, from early years learning to advanced university research.