EIFE & ORMAS
The Europe India Foundation for Excellence (EIFE) has been focused on Odisha since the formation of the foundation six years ago. On numerous occasions, the Foundation has sent senior members of its team to visit the state and hold discussions with senior officials of different departments in the Government of Odisha. And ORMAS shared the requirements of skill development in the state, in terms of a comprehensive skill mapping in the urban, rural and tribal areas of the state. In order to understand the current status of skill development and to map the way ahead, our team has also toured through the state on numerous occasions to meet with the ORMAS training providers (PIAs), visiting their training facilities, interacting with the trainers and trainees.
Following our detailed discussions with the government, the Foundation jointly developed an analysis of priority sectors that had been identified by the government for bringing the European expertise in Odisha. Based on this mandate, the Foundation had identified the best-suited partners for Odisha in the priority sectors of the ORMAS. After our extensive partner search, we had invited the Odisha delegation to visit Europe to meet with these Training Institutes, visit their facilities, sites and discussed our requirement with these potential partners.
The Odisha delegation then visited Europe on a 10-day trip in mid-October 2016. The visit covered France and Germany and we introduced them to about a dozen potential partners in the focused sector of ORMAS. At the end of the visit and while still in Europe, the Foundation had organised a detailed debriefing for the delegation, led by then Hon’ble Minister, who was very pleased with the outcomes of their first-ever interaction with European institutions and training partners in sectors of their interest and having visited numerous facilities that are the best in class in the world. Upon the return of the delegation, our team met with ORMAS team again and jointly we short-listed three potential partners for the welding project.
The partners were invited by the Odisha government to visit the state in late November 2016 to allow them to see the terrain for themselves and also have a second round of discussions with the government. In January 2017, the partners were invited to submit a financial proposal with the clear deliverable of training a batch of 30 Master Trainers from Odisha in welding, within a clear time frame, based on their discussion with the state government. The European Institutes submitted their proposal to the state Government after understanding the requirement of the state, resources available in the state and the expected outcome of the whole exercise.
Last year, the foundation submitted a proposal for being appointed as the European Consultant for the ORMAS and in August 2019, ORMAS approved the proposal of EIFE and on 20th August 2019; EIFE & ORMAS had signed an MOU with the clear objective of modernizing the exiting skill infrastructure of Odisha at World Skills level and bringing the best expertise from Europe to India and improving the skill ecosystem in the state with the help of European Training Partners.
Goals & Objectives of MOU
The Foundation will act as a European Consultant for ORMAS, Government of Odisha. The Foundation will act as a platform for the State Government to bring the best expertise from all over the world, with a key focus on Europe to India for modernizing the existing skill ecosystem in the state.
The Foundation will initiate discussions with select European Institutes to facilitate the state Government by evaluating the existing training facilities in the state and based on this evaluation provide an appropriate plan to the State Government to upgrade the existing facilities in pre-selected trades at international level. It will try to cover the Infrastructure, modern equipment, Training the Trainers (T3), curriculum, knowledge sharing, providing technical expertise, occupational standards, assessment, certification process and other activities based on the proposal and budget approval. We will try to bring the relevant partners onboard to complete at least four Training of trainer programmes, Trainers Assessment and bridge programmes for top students in different trades. Once the pool of Master Trainers has been created, EIFE, along with its European partners, would engage with Odisha government for the creation of a Centre of Excellence, which can become one of the most advanced centres of its kind, not only in India but in this part of the world. The framework focuses on five interlinked steps:
Step 1. Getting children off to the right start by developing the technical, cognitive, and behavioural skills early in life that creates a framework for later success. Research shows that the handicaps built in the early years are difficult, if not impossible, to remedy later in life and that effective early childhood development programmes can have a very high payoff.
Step 2.Ensuring that all students learn by building stronger systems with clear learning standards, good teachers, adequate resources, and a proper regulatory environment.
Step 3.Building job-relevant skills by developing the right incentives for both pre-employment and on-the-job training programmes and institutions.
Step 4.Encouraging entrepreneurship and innovation by creating an environment that encourages investments in knowledge and creativity.
Step 5.Facilitating labour mobility and job matching by moving toward more flexible, efficient, and secure labour markets.
Monthly Activities
After the delegation visit to Odisha, The foundation had a debriefing session with the nine-member delegation team from Europe to discuss the further action plan. The Foundation asked them to prepare their report on their meeting with the Government officials and the Training Institute and their observation related to the whole visit and what would they like to propose to the Government of Odisha to improve the skill ecosystem in Odisha and asked them to share their propose solution to upgrade the skill ecosystem to the Foundation and once the Foundation will receive the proposal we will evaluate the proposal at our end and then we will submit the proposal to Government of Odisha. And again we make this point very clear to all our European delegation that the cost should be that Indian Standard not as per European Standard.
Based on the discussion of the Foundation with the European Institutes, we are getting their reports based on their B2G and B2B meetings in Odisha. After compelling all the report the Foundation had prepared the final report of the European delegation visit and submitted to the Shri DK Singh, IAS, Principal Secretary, PR & DW Department, Government of Odisha. And after that, the Foundation discussed further activities with the senior official team to Odisha to discuss with ORMAS and finalize the further Plan of action. Based on the discussion now Foundation is planning the reverse visit of the Government of Odisha to Europe. The Foundation would like to invite you to visit Europe to evaluate the expertise, capacities and the training system of those Institutes who had visited the Odisha. This visit is not only focused on the meeting with the Institutes who had visited Odisha but also to meet New Institutes in new sectors.
The main purpose of the visit is to finalize some commercial activities and discussed the financial term & condition to execute the activity in Odisha pretty much on the lines of what we have already discussed in the debriefing session of the EIFE with you at your office in Odisha Secretariat along with the European delegation.
The Foundation is planning to organize the visit to France, Germany & Switzerland. In focused sectors i.e Manufacturing, Hospitality, Textile, Automotive, Construction, Energy (New & Renewable), Logistics and Water and wastewater management. And to organize the meetings for the government of Odisha the senior member team of the Foundation start visiting these three countries and met the number of Institutes over there. Plus we had also touched based all the existing partners. And in the last week of Feb 2020, we had submitted the final travel plan along with the itinerary to the Government of Odisha and once we will get the final order from the Government we will execute this visit to Europe. India and Europe have identified several new areas of cooperation. These range from deep-sea exploration to building knowledge-based economies and we hope that through this visit Government of Odisha will find their right partners to support their mission of Skilled Odisha.
The delegation visit was organised between January 11- 15. The visit was divided into two parts- starting with a workshop for the formal introduction of the European VET Model & the Indian VET model that was followed up with a discussion of the different opportunities of collaboration evaluating the current training infrastructure of the skill ecosystem of Odisha.
The visit aimed to increase collaboration between the skill training partners of the Odisha government and the European delegates from distinguished organisations. A one day-long workshop on “Promoting Vocational Education & Training” was also jointly organised during the visit which focused on sectors like manufacturing, textile, construction, healthcare & hospitality.
The keynote speakers from the government of Odisha included Shri Subroto Bagchi, the Chairman OSDA; Shri Deoranjan Kumar Singh; Principal Secretary in Department of PR & DW; Shri S R Pradhan, CEO of ORMAS; Shrimati Rasmita Panda, CEO, OSDA and Dr Badal Kumar Mohanty, Joint CEO, ORMAS.
The four technical sessions organised during the workshop acted as a stage facilitating discussion between the European delegates, the government representatives as well as the leading training and industry partners of ORMAS. In the four technical sessions, the Indian point of view was highlighted by both industry and academic leaders including Shri J D Giri, MD, Shahi Exports Pvt. Ltd.; Shri Ganpathy S R. Vice President, Training & Skill Dev., Quess Crop Ltd; Shri Rajiv Mehta, Chairman, NIAM Education Found; Shri Senthil Kumar Palani, CEO, ASD Education Pvt. Ltd; Shri Pruthwi Raj Das, Founder, Abbey West Services; Shri Jayendra Banerjee, National Head, Siesta; Prof. Mukti K Mishra, Chairman Centurion University; Shri K M Rajan, Senior Manager Training, CTTC and Shri Iswar Agasti, National Head, Asmacs Skills.
The discussions mainly centred around the current requirements of training institutions and industry in sectors like advanced manufacturing, apparels & garments; hospitality and construction. The workshop facilitated bridging the gap between the demand of skills by the industry and the level of existing skills provided by the training institutions to the youth of the state. It also helped the European delegation in understanding the focus areas for skill development in Odisha and the gaps between existing training and industry needs. After the workshop, ORMAS facilitated B2B meetings between the European delegation and training institutions & industries of Odisha to discuss the possibilities of collaboration between Odisha and Europe.
On the following day, the European delegation visited three training institutions in Bhubaneswar-Asmacs Skills Centre; Centurion University and Black Panther Training Institute to observe the training ecosystem of Odisha. After the visit, the Foundation had a debriefing session with Shri Deoranjan Kumar Singh, Principal Secretary in Department of PR & DW and Shri S.R Pradhan, CEO of ORMAS, in which the Principal Secretary had taken feedback from each European Institute and how they could support the Government of Odisha in upgrading the skill ecosystem of Odisha. In the concluding remarks, the Principal Secretary emphasised the need to conduct an assessment of trainers to understand their current level and based on this assessment, the Government of Odisha would shortlist the trainers for international training and modernising the training centre in Odisha as the European/International Standards.
After finalising the nine-member delegation team from Europe, the prime objective of the Foundation was to structure the event and finalise their travel plan and detailed itineraries in India/Odisha. With a tentative travel plan, members of the foundation met with senior officials of the Government fo Odisha and discussed the travel plan of the delegation, the programme agenda, their B2G and B2B meetings. A concept note, prepared by the Foundation, for the event and discussed as was the list of local invites. With the team of ORMAS, the Foundation members also visited some potential venues for the event and other logistical arrangements.
The Foundation also explained the key objective of the visit to the each European Institute and explained to them that the objective of the visit was to meet with the top representatives of the Odisha government as well as their select training partners. Plus, the delegation was also informed that they would get the opportunity to visit training centres of the ORMAS and to interact with the management, the trainers & the student of the institutes. Besides the visit, one key point of discussion with Odisha would be to finalise a Training of Trainers programme in pre define sectors.
The Foundation also explained to the delegation members that under the Training of Trainers programmes, the Odisha government would provide a pool of CVs of trainers and they would be their best available Trainers who could be trained to become Master Trainers. And the European Institutes would be requested to choose from this pool a final batch of a maximum of 30-40 trainers who would be trained by their team in India. They would have to send their Master trainers to India for this training programme after the final shortlist has been made. The batch of 30-40 trainers would then be imparted intensive training, to make them certified Master Trainers, with European certificate.
The Foundation had discussed that after this visit the European institutes would submit a comprehensive analysis of their intervention along with an overall plan/ proposal based on their analysis of the current skill ecosystem in Odisha. And the Foundation also said that each visiting institute was expected to submit their meeting report & proposed action plan or proposals within 30 days after their return to their home country. And once the Foundation receives the proposal, it would evaluate the proposals and then submit the proposal to Government of Odisha. The Foundation also made very clear to all our European delegation that the cost should be that Indian norms not as per European standards.
Subsequently, Ranvir Nayar, the Founding Director of the Foundation, met the CEO of ORMAS Shri S.R. Pradhan in Delhi, where the two discussed the agenda for a workshop on “Promoting Vocational Education & Training” in Bhubaneswar on January 13, 2020. The main objective of the workshop was to help the Indian participants understand the skill ecosystem of Europe and for the Europeans to identify the gaps in the skill ecosystem of Odisha by comparing it with the European VET model. The workshop would cater to the needs of both industry and training institutes in Odisha and facilitate bridging the gap between the demand of skills by the industry, the existing skills and the future skills.
It’s a very preliminary round of discussion, where the European delegation will share their work in skill development & experience and try to understand the skill ecosystem in Odisha and how they can fit into the skill ecosystem of the state. For Indian training institutes, it presents a unique opportunity to understand the European skill development and vocational education system and to scout for knowledge partners/experts who can transfer not just their know-how but also assist in the training of trainers, curriculum updation, joint certification, better assessment as well setting up of joint ventures in the domain of training, providing a unique opportunity for the youth of Odisha.
Subsequently, based on the discussion with Principal Secretary as well as senior officials of ORMAS regarding the visit of the European delegation to Odisha and the Odisha delegation’s proposed visit to Europe, the EIFE team got in touch with nearly two dozen shortlisted and relevant skill training partners in Europe, notably in Switzerland, Germany, France, Russia and Belgium, in order to prepare a shortlist for the visit to Odisha, scheduled for January 2020. These were in the sectors where ORMAS had expressed interest viz construction, advanced manufacturing, textiles, healthcare, hospitality and retail.
The Foundation began working to mount a delegation from Europe to India/Odisha. Senior members of the Foundation visited four countries- France, Germany, Switzerland & Russia and met with 50 training institutes in five key sectors Advanced Manufacturing; Healthcare; Construction; Hospitality; Textile, Leather & Garment.
In their meeting with the management of the top 50 institutes, the senior members of the Foundation explained the skill ecosystem in India, the current requirement of Government of India & Government of Odisha, showcased the business opportunities in the Indian market and finally invited them to visit India in January 2020.
Under the MOU with ORMAS, the objective of the Foundation was very clear viz to identify top institutes in the above sectors in Europe; evaluate their capacity, expertise & their willingness to work with India & Odisha and based on the requirement of the Government of Odisha mount a delegation from Europe to India of those partners who can support the Government of Odisha to enhance their capacity in the vocational & technical education sector. The Foundation started the communication & the promotion of the delegation visit to Odisha and had also run an e-mailer and social media campaign and ran event banners on multiple websites.
In collaboration with ORMAS, Government of Odisha, the Foundation shortlisted eight institutions from different countries of Europe and sent them the concept note of the visit along with the invitation, on behalf of the government of Odisha. The Foundation asked them to nominate one person from their institute, qualified to hold discussions with the senior representatives of Government of Odisha, while also having adequate technical knowledge of the sector. They were also free to bring another person from their team, at no cost to the Foundation or ORMAS.
By the third week of November, the foundation had received the nominations from all of the institutes and the foundation sent the profile of each institute along with the profile of the nominated representative of the institutes to the Government of Odisha and after a discussion with the team of the Government Odisha, the foundation had further shortlisted institutes and sent them the invites to join the delegation to visit Odisha to understand the skill ecosystem in the state and to propose the best possible solution to upgrade the skill ecosystem in the state. After the necessary approvals from the Government of Odisha, the Foundation made travel arrangements for the European Delegation and issued tickets to 9 members from 5 Institutions from three different countries of Europe – France, Germany & Russia. Hereunder the name of the Institutes and their representatives
Carl Duisberg Centren gemeinnützige GmbH, Germany
Jörg Kalmbach; Head of Professional Training Programs
Sonja Hagedorn; Project Manager
La Fabrique, France
Mathieu Rostaing; General secretary
Compagnons du Devoir, France
Yvick ROBIN; Director – Delegate to International and Overseas
Philippe DRESTO; Research and Development Director
WorldSkills Russia, Russia
Alina Doskanova; Deputy Director-General for International Relations
Aleksei Skorniakov; Chief of Macro-Regional Development Division
WorldSkills Services
Andzey Pivinskiy; CEO
In October, the Foundation met the CEO of ORMAS Government of Odisha in Delhi, where the EIFE team was briefed about the organisation of an “Industry CXO Summit” in Bhubaneswar. Industry CXO Summit is an innovative and interactive tool adopted by the ORMAS to augment its capacity to make effective provisions for employment and training by engaging industry resources. The summit caters to the needs of both industry and trainees (by providing relevant employment opportunities with acquired skills under the DDUGKY programme). It facilitates bridging the gap between the demand of skills by the industry and the existing skills with the youth of the state as it provides a common platform to all stakeholders. Besides making presentations and interventions at the event, the EIFE also promoted the summit among its partner European companies with operations in India and despite the short timeline, the EIFE communicated about the event to the top EU firms through direct contacts as well as a targeted emailer and promotion through social media and its website.
The EIFE identified over a dozen relevant companies, such as Airbus, Karcher, Renault and BIC, as per the topics of discussions during the Summit. However, unfortunately, the timing was not suitable as most company leaders were away, out of India, for other pre-scheduled meetings. Nonetheless, the EIFE has sensitised them to the growing business opportunities in Odisha and the rapid emergence of the state as a key business driver in eastern India. We hope to capitalise on this awareness and sensitisation shortly by organising meetings for ORMAS officials with these companies.
The EIFE sent a two-person delegation to participate in the meeting. We are thankful to ORMAS for providing us with a speaker slot during the Summit and on the key sector of skill development in construction. The presentation made by EIFE took the bull by the horn and pointed out the near absence of the industry in skill development, even though it is the industry that is the first and foremost beneficiary of a skilled workforce. The presentation also addressed other challenges such as inadequately trained trainers, curriculum, new technologies and concepts such as green building, carbon-neutral construction and smart buildings.
After the conference, the EIFE team held deliberations with Principal Secretary as well as senior officials of ORMAS to finalise the timelines and targets for the visit of the European delegation to India and the Odisha delegation’s proposed visit early next year.
In September, the EIFE again sent its senior team to Odisha to discuss further activities with ORMAS and finalize the Plan of action for the other activities during the year on September 6,019. The meeting was attended by the team of ORMAS, OSDA & EIFE under the leadership of Shri S R Pradhan, IAS, CEO, ORMAS. Hereunder is the list of participants in the meeting
S R Pradhan, IAS, CEO, ORMAS
Ranvir Singh Nayar, Director, EIFE
Badal Mahanty, Joint CEO, ORMAS
Om Prakash Routray, Dy, CEO, Skills
Deepak Srichandan, Dy, CEO, Skills
Neetkanth Rath, Dy, CEO, Skills
Nigam Dash, Dy, CEO, Skills
Nitin Bhusan, OSDA
Subash Padhi, OSDA
Vaibhav Agarwal, EIFE
Biswajit Kar, Placement Expert, TSA, ORMAS
Shantanu Banerjee, Dy CEO, Skills
At the meeting, the key points of discussions centred around the sectors and trades that could be the starting block for this cooperation. The CEO ORMAS suggested that advanced CNC, automotive manufacturing and servicing, advanced welding, construction and textiles can be the areas of the first intervention.
Those present concurred that the sectors and trades selected for conduction of ToTs should have employment opportunities for the students to ensure that the benefit of the ToTs percolates to the students as well. In this regard, the trades and especially the particular training of trainers to be conducted would be forward-looking and as closely integrated with Industry 4.0 as possible. The EIFE delegates also emphasised the importance of taking up activities in areas which have close linkages with the industry, to make the training fruitful for the students and lead to their upskilling and better employability.
The EIFE then offered to invite some of the leading European training partners in the above domains to Odisha in January in order to organise their meetings with senior officials and experts of ORMAS and OSDA as well as with the top 10 PIAs and ITIs/Polytechnics in the relevant sectors. It would be a very preliminary round of discussion, where the European delegation, the European Institutes will share their work in skill development and experience and try to understand the skill ecosystem in Odisha and how they can fit into this skill ecosystem of Odisha. Each of the EU institutes would be represented by a 1-2 person. In addition, during the whole visit, two EIFE representatives will accompany the delegation, one from Paris and one from India.
Based upon the outcomes of the deliberations, EIFE will coordinate with the European partners as well as ORMAS to finalise the proposals for conducting of ToTs in the shortlisted trades. The EIFE will also submit a visit report with bullet points and conduct a debriefing session with ORMAS & European partners. A follow-up visit by ORMAS officials to Europe to visit these centres and finalise the elements of ToTs to be conducted can be scheduled during the first week of February 2020.
As a first activity based on the MOU, the Foundation organised a visit by ORMAS delegation to Russia for World Skills Competition Kazan 2019 in August 2019. The Competition brings together top experts, international partners, government agencies and educational institutions. The business programmes include plenary and project sessions, government-to-government (G2G) and business-to-business (B2B) meetings, skills centres visits. We believe that Russia has a lot to offer to India, in the precise sectors such as defence, manufacturing, hospitality, construction, healthcare, renewable energy, etc, all the areas where India faces a huge skill gap.
Participating in the event and with the focused pre-fixed meetings with a large number of potential partners, organised by the EIFE, allowed the state Government of Odisha to see the best practices of the Russian technical and vocational education and training system and Government of Odisha had visited the World Skills Centers in Moscow & Kazan and had done a detailed discussion with Management of the Institutes to bring all these ultra-modern education infra to India and do Odisha.
Odisha’s Visit to World Skills Competition 2019, Kazan
Organised by EIFE & WSR | 20th Aug – 29th Aug 2019
After evaluating the invitation of Europe India Foundation for Excellence the Government of Odisha has deputed a delegation from the state to attend the World Skills Competition in Kazan and also to visit TVET (Technical & Vocational Education and Training) institutes for understanding the best practices.
The delegation consisted of the following officials:-
Shri DK Singh, IAS – Principal Secretary, PR & DW Department
Shri Sanjay Kumar Singh, IAS -Commissioner cum Secretary, SD & TE Department
Shri SR Pradhan, IAS – Director, NRLM and CEO, ORMAS
Shri Nitin Bhushan – Odisha Skill Development Authority
And Shri Rajiv Mehta, chairman, NIAM, PIA of ORMAS was also nominated by the PR & DW Department to attend the World Skills Kazan 2019.
The visit to Russia has also opened many horizons for boosting the skill development ecosystem in Odisha. The key learning from Russia and their achievement during the World Skills 2019 is that they have webbed a strong network of TVET Institutes around the standards of World Skills by taking along Industry with them. The idea of World Skills Russia and World Skill Center (to be established by Odisha Skill Development) is akin. Both models focus on developing advance professional competencies at par with the world’s best standards whilst benchmarking the same with World Skills Competition.
The journey of Russia to achieve 14 Golds in single World Skills Competition within seven years is remarkable whereas Odisha has started its journey in 2018 and to receive the first gold for India within a short period has set the tone for many more achievements in time to come. The journey has just started for the Odisha Government and to achieve bigger things they need to have a focussed approach to boost the skill ecosystem.
The way ahead the delegation recommends for the Skill ecosystem are as follows:-
World Skills Centre is the right approach to go about. Like Russia, the vision of the Government of Odisha should be centred around World skills as a benchmark.
The Academy at World Skill Center should be working around the World Skills Model, where the competitors after the State Skills can be trained rigorously for competing at World Skills Competitions. There should be a facility to train the 8 – 10 competitors who can participate in skill-specific competitions and also prepare for World Skills Competitions.
Engage directly with technology partners of skills in World Skills.
The resources of OSDA and ORMAS should be leveraged upon for boosting skill development ecosystem. This shall include:-
Leverage of funds (DDUGKY funds if possible) for up-gradation of our labs and making it open for short term skilling to PIAs.
OSDA to leverage partnerships of ORMAS with TAFE, EIFE and Welding Institute, Germany for the training of ITI faculty.
Participation by our winners of Odisha Skills in all International Skills Contest before next World Skills and send our students and mentor to participate in each one of them in partnership with DDUGKY.
Sponsor PIAs and Faculty of Polys and ITI to different Skill Competitions in collaboration with DDUGKY.
Partnership with various agencies for holding various Skills Competition and build competency around it.
Explore the opportunities for collaboration with NSDC & World Skill Russia for Organising the Competition for Trainers in Bhubaneswar.
Reports
Events
EU-India workshop on “Promoting Vocational Education and Training” organised by ORMAS & EIFE
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