Practice-Oriented Teaching in Smart Grids
Majority of new technologies in electrical engineering nowadays belong to the field of smart grids. Smart grids master programs are being implemented in the Western Balkans countries through the EU funded project ELEMEND. Within smart grids curriculum, practice-oriented teaching is crucial to teach students practical skills needed on the job market. This paper presents the practice-oriented approach of the team from the Public Electric Utility Elektroprivreda of Bosnia and Herzegovina d.d. - Sarajevo, being taught at the International Burch University within three courses from the Smart Grids in Electrical Distribution Systems master program. Apart from the basic theoretical knowledge, students are given projects with real-life problems and real data. Students are being trained to do projects using two commercial software tools. Projects are often on some of the challenging topics of smart grids and the final results of the project are therefore often published in international and national journals and conferences. Also, excursions and site visits to real-life visits of some of the smart grid technologies are organized, as well as internships for some of the students. Therefore, students are at the end trained and qualified for smart grid related jobs on the job market.