SHELL, other IOCS take on pioneer students of Rivers University Centre of Excellence In offshore engineering

Wed, Jul 17, 2019
By publisher
3 MIN READ

Oil & Gas

THE pioneer students of The Shell Petroleum Development Company of Nigeria Limited,

SPDC JV-sponsored Centre of Excellence in Marine and Offshore Engineering at the Rivers

State University, RSU CoE, Port Harcourt, have commenced the mandatory six months Research

Internship with Shell Nigeria Exploration and Production Company, SNEPCo, in Lagos.

The Research Internship is a key requirement for the award of the Master of Science degree after

a year of academic work.

While four students are working with SNEPCo, three others are with Total Exploration and

Production Nigeria and the remaining three students are with BW Offshore in a successful

collaboration between industry and academia.

The SPDC General Manager External Relations, Igo Weli, said, “The Research Internship enables

the students to have critical industry-experience, hands-on practical training and opportunity to

undertake post-graduate research under competent industry supervisors and working with

state-of-the-art facilities.”

“The programme enables us to graduate industry-ready young Nigerians and domicile in-country

several services usually provided by expatriates,” he said.

Director of the RSU CoE, Dr. Ibiba Douglas, said, “All 10 pioneer students of the Centre have

commenced internship in the respective companies to which they are engaged and after the Internship phase, in December 2019, the students, on their return to school, will defend their M. Sc. thesis in order to graduate.”

Meanwhile, eight post graduate students of another SPDC JV-sponsored Centre of Excellence in

Geosciences and Petroleum Engineering at the University of Benin, UniBen CoE, who recently

concluded the compulsory six months Internship with SPDC, have described the experience

as “a landmark in their career.”

Orilade Success, writing on behalf of his fellow Interns, said, “The past six months have been a

landmark experience in our careers. We have taken note of the learnings and feedback and, moving

forward, we won’t let you down as ambassadors of this reputable organization. This is certainly a

step in the right direction for all of us.”

In 2013, SPDC collaborated with the University of Benin to begin academic work at the Centre of

Excellence for post graduate studies in Geosciences and Petroleum Engineering and the Director

of the UniBen CoE, Professor Joseph Ebeniro, said, “SPDC JV investment in talented Nigerian

youth, supported by other industry stakeholders, is providing special academic platform to

produce industry-ready graduates for employment in the E&P industry, as well as undertake

research to address industry challenges.”

Weli said, “SPDC JV has a long history of support for education in Nigeria. As part of its

commitment to the holistic education of Nigerians, especially young people from its areas

of operations, SPDC JV currently runs four categories of scholarship schemes.”

“These are Regular Secondary School Scholarship Scheme (providing annual financial support to

secondary school students); Cradle-to-Career (another Secondary School Scholarship Scheme

focused on providing quality full-boarding secondary education in reputable private secondary

schools to selected talented primary six pupils from public schools across Nigeria and developing

the recipients into functional citizens that can confidently face life and compete favourably with

their counterparts from anywhere in the world); and University Scholarship Scheme (started in

1953 and is a flagship programme providing support to Nigerian students in all accredited

Universities across Nigeria), ” Weli said.

“The fourth category, the SPDC JV Post Graduate Scholarships scheme (launched in 2009 and

aimed at building a talent pipeline in our host communities) is a one-year master’s degree

programme offering selected post graduate scholarships for the training of graduates in the core

competence areas of petroleum Engineering, Subsurface Studies and facilities engineering in three

of the topmost universities in these fields in the United Kingdom.”

BE

– July 16, 2019 @ 09:15 GMT |

 

Tags: