AmSU has selected the finalists of the International Engineering Championship "CASE-IN"

On Wednesday, April 18, Amur State University hosted the regional stage of the International Engineering Case-In Championship in the field of Petrochemistry. The first-place team will represent the Amur Region at the finals, which will be held in Moscow at the end of May.

Competitions in the field of Petrochemistry are held with the support of the SIBUR gas processing and petrochemical holding. This year, for the first time, the direction was included in the program of the Case-In championship. Welcoming the participants, Alexander Ostapenko, Vice Rector for Informatization and New Educational Technologies at Amur State University, noted: "Engineering Olympiads are a trend in which we will always participate." Companies are interested in new personnel who are well prepared to work in the industry.

The competition in the field of Petrochemistry was officially opened in March at the National Research Tomsk Polytechnic University. Together with Blagoveshchensk, the Case-In Championship is hosted in Tomsk, Nizhny Novgorod, Voronezh, Perm, Samara and Ufa.

The Case-In Championship is an international competition system for solving engineering cases. The students, who have joined groups of three or four people, are given the case study "Tobolsk Petrochemical Cluster: a new formula for integration and value creation." In 10 days, the students had to solve tasks related to the SIBUR production facility operating in Tobolsk, as well as the ZapSibNeftekhim complex under construction: identify so-called bottlenecks, propose innovative and energy-efficient solutions, develop a specific set of measures and give them an economic justification. "After receiving the case, we thought it was very difficult. The case is new to us," admits first–year student Kirill Prikhodko. "We have collected all the proposed ideas and selected the priority one."

When considering the decision, the experts assessed not only the originality of the conclusions from the proposed situations, but also the level of students' training, as well as detailed answers to the commission's questions. "The impressions are very good, and the participants have a high level of training," said Artur Kovin, a member of the Petrochemistry jury and chief expert of SIBUR's technological efficiency department. – The guys found scientific developments, patents, and came up with ways to save money on production. Those who were in practice in Tobolsk were able to establish contact with the production and make the most of their knowledge."

The experts were addressed by representatives of eight teams – 30 students in total. The performance of each team according to the rules took exactly six minutes. The students presented presentations and answered questions from the experts. The criterion of victory is a high–quality study of the case. Even if the solution proposed by the students does not fully answer all the questions raised, the participants of the championship must demonstrate a comprehensive engineering approach. Much attention was also paid to the economic feasibility of innovation. After all, you need to be able to sell any idea to colleagues or investors.

Of the eight teams, the top three were determined. Diplomas for the third place in the International Engineering Case-In Championship were presented to the Novy Element team by Alexander Ostapenko, Vice Rector for Informatization and New Educational Technologies at AmSU. The Anadar team, which took the second place, was congratulated by Artur Kovin, SIBUR's chief expert. The first place was won by the DFM team. The ticket to the championship finals was presented to the winners by Andrey Polyuliakh, General Director of SIBUR's separate structural division in Blagoveshchensk.

"We know the topic very well," says Denis Potapchuk, the captain of the winning team and a second–year student at AmSU. – We were at the site in Tobolsk in practice. When you have a lot of information on a topic, it's pretty easy to talk. When you know not only what you're talking about, but also a little more, you don't get lost."

SIBUR is already actively cooperating with Amur State University: Amur students and teachers have completed internships at SIBUR's production sites in Tobolsk. Four graduates of the university in 2017 were employed. Another group of students is currently undergoing an internship. It is planned that after graduation, the students will work for three years in Tobolsk at a hydrocarbon processing plant that is part of SIBUR. And then, having acquired the necessary skills, the young specialists will return to the Amur region to work at processing plants in the Svobodny district.

The winners of the qualifying stage of the championship will travel to Moscow, where the final of the International Engineering Case-In Championship will be held on May 30 and 31. The winning team of the final stage will receive not only an award, but also a cup. "I think all the winners of the stages, and even more so the finalists, have a high chance of being included in the list of potential trainees. SIBUR is actively investing in young people. We understand that we cannot take specialists from the market – there is a shortage of them. We have to grow them ourselves. Therefore, we are actively involved in such championships as WorldSkills and Case-In," concluded Arthur Kovin.

A source