By Yonas Mesfin
Ethiopian Railway Academy has developed nine Occupational Standards (OS) for rail transport subsector in collaboration with the Ethiopian Federal Technical and Vocational Education and Training Agency (FTA). In the development process, FTA provided technical assistance in the development and revision of OSs to industry practitioners gathered from Addis Ababa Light Rail Transit Service (AALRTS), Ethio-Djibouti Railway share Company and Awash- Kombolcha-Hara Gebeya (AKH) Railway construction Project.
The industry practitioners from the three enterprises were carefully identified with more than five years of sound practical experiences in their respective fields and the majority is 2nd degree holders in rail electrical, mechanical and civil engineering fields.
The identified occupations and developed occupational standards are in the areas of rail transport operation, maintenance and rail construction as first phase of occupational standards’ development.
The development at Ethiopian Management Institute-Debre-Zeit Management Training Center in September 2021 activity took 16 days. The nine occupational standards developed include:
- Locomotive Driving,
- Rail Transport Operation,
- Railway Signaling and Communication.
- Rolling Stock Mechanical Maintenance,
- Rolling Stock Electrical and Electronics System Maintenance,
- Railway Civil Works Construction and Maintenance,
- Railway Track Installation and Maintenance,
- Railway Power Substation Maintenance, and
- Railway Electrical Contact System Maintenance,
ERC-RA also conducted fruitful validation workshop for the developed occupational standards, with wide and large number of representation from14 relevant large corporations, enterprises and technical education and training institutions including previous participants on OSs development and revision processes in November 2021.
The developed/revised occupational standards were validated through in depth discussion with pervious developers, added or removed, or modified existing unit of competence and finalized the document for editorial activity to submit the OSs for approval by relevant authority.
The Academy has a plan to develop 11 long-term and five short-term demand-driven programs in the railway subsector training programs. These occupational standards are one of the major activities to accomplish demand-driven programs.
The Writer is a Monitoring and Evaluation Specialist at Ethiopia Railway Academy