USAID Energy Sector Internship Program 2015
A sunny afternoon, my watch shows 12:30pm and I am in Boeing 737-400 airplane right now. Got a window seat luckily and heading to back to Karachi from Islamabad. The first time I visited Islamabad was to participate in National Games in 2014. I had stopped writing about my travel experiences in 2013. The last time I wrote about, was my trip to Lahore for the National Games in 2013. I used to be a Professional Hockey Player and I was part of the playing 11 team of Karachi and Sindh Women’s Hockey Team.
This time I decided to write again because this was the first time I was travelling as an Electrical Engineer not a Hockey Player. One of the reasons to write about this is so that I keep reminding myself that the choice I made 4 years ago was the best thing I did for myself and my future. It was quite tough to create balance between Hockey and Electrical Engineering for all these years but the effort for creating this balance made me stronger than ever.
The reason I went to Islamabad this time was to attend the orientation and professional development session of USAID Energy Sector Internship Program which is a part of USAID initiative called Training for Pakistan Project. I applied for this 6 month internship program in April 2015. There were 11,000 applicants who applied for this program. These applicants were then shortlisted on the basis of their CVs. 971 applicants were then shortlisted out of the 11,000. These 971 candidates were then asked to give an online screening test by which these candidates were further shortlisted and 165 candidates were selected to be part of this training program. Out of these, 155 interns attended the orientation program and signed the internship agreement. USAID TFP team invited all the interns, who were placed at different government sector companies all over Pakistan along with the professionals who were chosen as their supervisors at the respective companies, to attend a two day orientation and professional development session at Islamabad. Following are the names of the government sector companies which were part of the internship program,
· Oil and Gas Development Company Ltd. (OGDCL), Islamabad and Karachi
· Private Power Infrastructure Board (PPIB), Islamabad
· National Electric and Power Regulatory Authority (NEPRA), Islamabad
· Alternative Energy Development Board (AEDB), Islamabad
· Ministry of Water and Power, Islamabad
· Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Resources, Islamabad
· Ministry of Finance (Economic Reforms Unit), Islamabad
· Ministry of Planning Development and Reform, Islamabad
· Water and Power Development Authority (WAPDA), Attock, Mianwali, Mirpur, Haripur
· Muzaffargarh Thermal Power Station (GENCO-III), Muzaffargarh
· National Transmission and Dispatch Company Ltd. (NTDC) Lahore
· Sui Northern Gas Pipeline Ltd. (SNGPL), Lahore
· Jamshoro Thermal Power Station (GENCO-I), Jamshoro
· Guddu Thermal Power Station (GENCO-II), Guddu
· Sui Southern Gas Pipeline Ltd. (SSGPL), Karachi
· Port Qasim Authority (PQA), Karachi
· Peshawar Electric Supply Company (PESCO), Peshawar
· Quetta Electric Supply Company (QESCO), Quetta
Airfare, lodging, food, everything was arranged and all the expenses were taken care of by USAID during our stay at Islamabad. As I am a resident of Karachi, I was placed at Port Qasim Authority (PQA), met our supervisor who is a Deputy Manager of Private Sector Projects Department and Director General (Technical) from PQA at the orientation session. They were very supportive and appreciative.
I am really looking forward to this training program and I hope I have positive views to share by the end of it!
Cheers.
