Following the study tour organized by CAPRED for I4-WEE students to visit Mr. Dy Piseth’s water supply station in Kampong, Dr. CHHUON Kong, and colleagues of the faculty of Hydrology and Water Resources Engineering (HRE) at ITC had a meeting with Ms. TIN Mola, infrastructure lead from CAPRED at Faculty office on July 19th, 2023.
After introducing the background of CAPRED and the Faculty to each other, Dr. Kong his colleagues have shared the challenges of education on water supply engineering at the faculty on 1) water supply engineering student’s practices in the lab and in water operators , 2) real job market need and salary for fresh graduate of water supply engineer, and 3) Women in water supply engineering. Both parties discussed about collaborations including GEDSI and youth participation in WASH sector, a new associate program in water supply, and the new set up lab for water supply and plumbing at ITC. Both parties acknowledge the need to engage more engineering students in the water supply sector. Ms. Mola agreed to consider the possibility of coordinating the students to do internships at water supply systems with the support of CAPRED. Dr. Kong proposed that in order to close the gap on lacking of human resource with correct skill in water supply sector, we should work together with all relevant stakeholders to map out the human resource needed by all water operators in the country and keep updating the information to be used by academic intuitions for matching between real need and real supply.