TÜV Continuing Education Courses at HSZG

The TÜV courses offered for years at Zittau/Görlitz University of Applied Sciences to qualify students as environmental, occupational safety, or energy management officers were placed on a new, institutionalized footing at the start of the 2016 summer semester. Karin Hollstein, Chancellor of the Zittau/Görlitz University of Applied Sciences, and Henry Schmidt, Regional Sales Manager for the Central/Eastern Region at TÜV Rheinland Akademie GmbH, signed a cooperation agreement between the two institutions in February regarding the joint implementation of these continuing education programs.

The cooperation is based on a long-standing collaboration between faculty members at the university—such as Prof. Dr. Rudolf Förster, Prof. Dr. Jana Brauweiler, and Dipl.-Kff. Anke Zenker-Hoffmann—and TÜV Rheinland Akademie GmbH.

“Prof. Förster began offering courses for quality management officers as early as 1999. We ‘borrowed’ the idea and launched a course for ‘Environmental Management Officers’; as the importance of other management systems in companies grew, courses for ‘Occupational Safety Management Officers’ and ‘Energy Management Officers’ were added,”

explains Jana Brauweiler regarding the development of the partnership. The role of these officers is to take responsibility for steering the introduction, implementation, and maintenance of the respective management system and to carry out a wide range of operational tasks independently. Participation in these courses is attractive to students because the courses are offered at a special, affordable university rate, and students receive the “TÜV certificate”—which is highly valued in the job market—as proof of their knowledge and skills, which sets them apart from competitors when applying for jobs.

“This is particularly important when starting a career,”

confirms Anke Zenker-Hoffmann from the Faculty of Natural and Environmental Sciences.

“In the course of our collaboration, we have trained approximately 1,400 students from the Zittau/Görlitz University of Applied Sciences and the IHI Zittau to become management officers. Of these, 882 students alone have been trained as quality management officers,”

says Henry Schmidt, summarizing the results of the collaboration.

“The integration of the TÜV courses into the continuing education program at Zittau/Görlitz University of Applied Sciences was long overdue,”

says Robert Viertel of the Center for Knowledge and Technology Transfer (ZWT) with a smile. He is pleased about the collaboration between the two strong institutions, and with regard to the target audience, he notes:

“Academic continuing education is a growing area for the university, and with these offerings, we’re reaching out to our students as well as graduates and other interested professionals in the field.”

Student demand for additional TÜV certifications remains strong, as demonstrated by the courses on “Energy Management Systems according to ISO 50001” and “Occupational Health and Safety Management Systems According to OHSAS 18001/ISO 45001, ” in which a total of 30 students from various faculties at Zittau/Görlitz University of Applied Sciences participated. The next courses— “Environmental Management Systems According to ISO 14001 and EMAS” —and another course on “Energy Management Systems According to ISO 50001” will be held in April/May 2016. Additionally, new courses are planned, such as those on “Project Management” and “IT Security Management.” The TÜV courses are promoted and organized by the ZWT.

For more information: www.hszg.de/tüv

Prof. Dr. Jana Brauweiler