A New Performance Award System for Petroleum Engineering Students - Development and Implementation

2009 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Michael Williams
Author(s):  
Jeremy M. Gernand

To better understand how improved understanding of uncertainty and probability concepts in an engineering systems context would affect undergraduate engineering students’ perceptions of professional responsibility and ethics as well as personal agency (one’s ability to affect the outcome of events), an assessment of these principles was conducted during a related course. A course entitled Engineering Risk Analysis was offered and conducted with a mix of undergraduate Mechanical Engineering, Chemical Engineering, Petroleum Engineering, Environmental Systems Engineering, and Architectural Engineering students. This course presented and trained students in the use of system analysis techniques from the disciplines of Reliability Engineering, Policy Analysis, and Economics for understanding how uncertain circumstances interact with technological systems to produce failures and disasters. As engineering systems become increasingly complex and command greater quantities of energy, the risk of failures even when very rare, become much more severe. While there have been previous initiatives to increase engineering students’ understanding of statistics, probability, and risk, usually in response to previous disasters, this preliminary study is the first to begin to examine how this kind of knowledge affects engineering student’s perceptions of ethics, responsibility, and their concept of how their own individual decisions affect the potential for the failure of complex systems and the consequences of such failures. Students completed 5 regular survey-based assessments to judge their qualitative and quantitative skills, personal perceptions of the causes of engineering failures, and the professional and ethical responsibilities of engineers. Analysis of the response variance and a linear regression model demonstrated some significant effects after controlling for education, age, and professional work experience. Results indicate that questions related to probabilistic understanding of risk demonstrated the most significant change during the course. Indicators of agreement with strong professional ethics and greater professional responsibility as well as personal agency did not significantly change during the course. More importantly, while personal choices on risk did not appear to reflect one’s view of how engineers actually do or should treat questions of risk professionally, the amount of previous technical work experience showed a small positive association with increased agreement on statements of ethical responsibility towards workers and the public. These findings suggest that future research is needed to assess the types of instruction and personal experience that can best encourage the combination of strong ethical responsibility and personal agency that could empower engineering students to act when they have the opportunity to reduce risk to workers, the public, or the environment.


2015 ◽  
Vol 3 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert Montalván Burbano ◽  
Ana Tapia Blacio ◽  
Gilda Rubira Gómez

La creatividad es una característica personal relevante a cultivar en cualquier profesión, trabajo o actividad. Organizaciones y empresas valoran mucho a las personas creativas y normalmente estas son las que finalmente son consideradas en un proceso de reclutamiento. A pesar de que es posible que existan individuos más creativos que otros, el presente estudio propone reconocer las potencialidades innatas y fomentar la creatividad dentro de los estudiantes de la UPSE. A través de una investigación exploratoria se recabó información de 100 estudiantes de Ingeniería en Petróleos para medir el nivel creativo, obstáculos y elementos clave respecto a su propia creatividad. Fueron incluidas también algunas ideas para promover y desarrollar la creatividad a través de talleres y clubes creativos.   Palabras Clave: Fomento a la creatividad, estudiantes creativos, fuerza creativa, creatividad institucional   ABSTRACT   Creativity is a personal characteristic relevant to develop at any career, job or activity. Organizations and companies’ value creative people and normally those are the ones that actually get hired in a recruiting process for a job opening. Although it may exist individuals more creative than others, this study proposes to acknowledge their inner potential and to promote creativity within UPSE students. 100 Petroleum Engineering students were surveyed through an exploratory research in order to measure their creativity level, their opinion about obstacles and key elements regarding personal creativeness. They were also included ideas to foster and to develop creativeness through workshops and creativity clubs.   Keywords: Fostering creativity, creativity on students, school creativity.   Recibido: febrero 2015Aprobado: abril 2015


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Maria Jose Cruz-Tun ◽  
Fernando Sebastian Flores-Avila

Abstract This work shows an analysis of the total enrollment, new admissions, graduates and degrees awarded in Petroleum Engineering at Bachelor's level in the last 10 years in Mexico, according to the statistical yearbooks published by the Asociación Nacional de Universidades e Instituciones de Educación Superior (ANUIES), which will allow to know the expected behavior of the student enrollment for the next 5 years. The digital transformation is discussed to propose the strategy of education in the medium and long term. An analysis is carried out on the study plans of 11 universities that teach Petroleum Engineering and have an active student chapter of the Society of Petroleum Engineers (SPE) in Mexico, to know the subjects taught and detect possible modifications supported by the compression of automation elements such as data analysis and artificial intelligence. Actions taken by other universities in the world for transition from traditional education to an education aligned to new global needs are discussed as well. Results show that student enrollment exhibits a strong dependence on barrel prices, the higher the price per barrel, the greater the number of new students enrolled. Student ranges from 4,800 to 13,663 at their peak. Derived from the fall in oil prices in 2014, there is an average annual decrease of 12%. If the trend continues to be the same, there will be less than 3,000 Petroleum Engineering students in Mexico by 2025. There are 55 Petroleum Engineering schools in the country, Veracruz and Tabasco together account for 56.5% of graduates nationwide in 2019. Technological innovations and technical challenges should shape the curricula in the Petroleum Engineering degree. It was also detected that the current education contemplates the study of traditional technologies, so it is advisable to align efforts to improve and strengthen the curricula of the universities that already offer the degree, instead of opening new schools. Mexico's national fields face increasingly complex technical challenges, such as the production of mature fields, unconventional reservoirs, deep-water exploration, and heavy and extra-heavy oils. Current Petroleum Engineering students are the ones who in few years will make important decisions about the direction of the industry, so it is of great interest to know the quality and quantity of them, and focus efforts on addressing deficiencies in fields related to technical challenges.


2021 ◽  
Vol 73 (02) ◽  
pp. 51-51
Author(s):  
Jordan Mimoun

At first glance, well testing may not come across as high-tech. At a time of rampant digitalization, with catchy phrasing such as “machine learning” and “Internet of things,” how can we compete with “slip joints” and “Bourdet derivatives” from the ’80s? Further down Memory Lane, bubble buckets and semilog graph paper look even more as if they are from a bygone era. Yet the former are still relied upon in specific onshore applications (I used one 2 years ago), and petroleum engineering students continue to learn the fundamentals of pressure transient analysis with the latter. Most of today’s equipment and interpretation methods are indeed not new. After all, well testing has been around for nearly a century, resulting in a legacy that may not always look cutting-edge, but these tried-and-true tools (both hardware and analytical) were so technologically remarkable that they became staples. Call it pragmatism; others may retort that “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” These tools enable operators to test exploration and appraisal wells before any production facilities are installed, flowing hydrocarbons to a drilling rig in a controlled and safe manner, sometimes for the first time since these molecules were trapped millions of years ago. Service companies developed equipment that can be operated under a variety of conditions, enhancing the operator’s flexibility to tailor to virtually any circumstances, while layering in safety features and contingencies. Disturbances stemming from flowing the well are recorded by gauges that can resolve minuscule pressure changes. Far beyond permeability thickness at the well, the resulting pressure transients yield insights into reservoir architecture, thereby illuminating the operator’s subsurface understanding to inform field development and a lifetime of reservoir management. A nonexhaustive list of recent improvements and additions to our toolbox includes: Acoustic telemetry for wireless equipment actuation in temporary completions Wet-mate connectors for formation-face instrumentation in permanent completions Fiber optics for distributed temperature and acoustics with no moving parts Multiwell deconvolution for application to producing fields A business tenet contends that a compromise must be sought between quality, cost, and time. You may have heard it as “good, cheap, or fast - pick two.” While this is a simplistic vision that omits other key dimensions, technology has undeniably improved the value proposition of well testing. This month’s papers exemplify the vibrancy of technology in our discipline. Well tests are the linchpin of a carbonate’s appraisal campaign and unlock dynamic insights into nonmatrix behavior otherwise inaccessible from static logs. Heterogeneity in unconventional rocks is recognized with a fully integrated reservoir/fracture/wellbore simulator that can model different layers of varying thickness, stiffness, hardness, and stress, to name but a few. A convolutional neural network offers a brilliant engineering control to complement the traditional flare watchers and proactively monitor suboptimal combustion, furthering our industry’s environmental commitment. In the suggestions for additional reading, peruse the elegant Bayesian take on uncertainty analysis and the intriguing combination of geomechanics and well testing.


Author(s):  
Nayef Alyafei ◽  
◽  
Rashid Al Musleh ◽  
Jerahmeel Bautista ◽  
Mohamed Idris ◽  
...  

We designed a multidimensional visual learning project with the primary goal of helping undergraduate students better understand fundamental concepts in petrophysics through a set of exercises centered around an analysis of flooding experiment images. More specifically, we focused on concepts related to the trapped fluid within a rock’s pores in this project. To do this, eight different pore networks with unique internal structures were used and then 3D printed. The models were printed using a transparent resin to showcase the movement of fluids inside the rock model. The fluid’s displacement within the 3D-printed rock model was recorded using a high-definition camera, and still images were taken. Undergraduate petroleum engineering students were then assigned a set of exercises to guide them through an analysis of the pore network model images. Students conducted the analysis through an open-source image analysis software (Fiji) to help explore and better understand fundamental petrophysical properties: porosity, fluid saturation, wettability, grain-size distribution, and displacement efficiency. A survey was given to the students to gauge the effectiveness of the exercise in improving their understanding of these concepts. Survey results illustrated that the project-based learning exercises were effective in helping students to better understand difficult-to-grasp petrophysical concepts as they could be more easily visualized through the captured flooding experiment images and the accompanying analysis. An additional benefit to this unique visual learning experience is the ease at which it can be delivered remotely to adhere to safety measures as a result of the global COVID-19 pandemic.


Author(s):  
Herianto Herianto ◽  
Ratna Widyaningsih ◽  
Ristiyan Ragil Putradianto

In the previous period, to determine the ability of petroleum engineering students in mastering the concept of the field of knowledge, in general, a comprehensive exam was used by writing papers and being tested. This method is considered ineffective because of the large number of plagiarism cases and many students who take more than one semester to complete. Therefore, a breakthrough was made by creating a new method, namely the Computer Assisted Test with Real-Time Assessment software. The purpose of the replacement of this method is that students can master three areas of expertise and can complete comprehensive courses in less than one semester. The first step in the process of replacing this comprehensive course method is done by spreading the old method satisfaction questioner and mastery of the group of experts with the old method. The second stage is to make a question bank made by a lecturer in the petroleum engineering department. The third stage is done by making Real-Time Assessment software. Then the question bank input that has been made into the RTA software is carried out. The final step is to simulate an exam with RTA software. Based on the results of the study, it is known that 75% of students are not satisfied with the old comprehensive system and 95% of students only master two or one of the three fields of expertise in the petroleum engineering department. This shows that the old method is no longer effective, so it is necessary to change the comprehensive method. Comprehensive test results with the method, namely the Computer Assisted Test with Real-Time Assessment software, show good results. Where in the third stage of the exam 95% of participants passed the exam and 96% of the question banks made were feasible to be tested.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document