Competent Team - more than two thousand students sponsored by KGHM

Higher academic scholarships, up to 2,000 zlotys for special achievements, and a record number of students in first grades. KGHM is expanding its “Competent in the Industry” educational program and motivating students in the new school year.

“In this school year, as many as 651 students will start participating in our ‘Competent in the Industry’ program. This is a record number and proof that students are eager to choose classes sponsored by KGHM. We offer equipment for classrooms, internships in our divisions, substantive support, and a scholarship system. The best graduates can also count on being hired, and the popularity of the program shows that young people consider us an attractive employer,” said Tomasz Zdzikot, the CEO of KGHM Polska Miedź S.A.

Most of this year’s first grade students will be studying to become electricians, but the program also includes specialized occupations, such as underground miner of minerals other than coal, operator of processing machinery and equipment, smelter technician, and metallurgical industry technician.

The program “Competent in the Mining and Metallurgy Industry. KGHM - a key partner in vocational education” was launched in 2018 and involves close cooperation between schools and KGHM. The alumni of the program already include several thousand students from nine schools in the Copper Belt. Both the interest in the program and the number of first grade students in the sponsored classes increase each year. The program is constantly evolving in response to expectations and needs of the market.

“During the summer vacation, we met with school directors, discussed plans for the next school year, and updated our program to motivate students to deepen their knowledge, but also to try their hand at apprenticeships at our Divisions,” said Marek Makuch, the Managing Director for Human Resources Management at KGHM. “We increased the amounts of the scholarships: to 1,000 zlotys for the academic scholarship and to 2,000 zlotys for the special achievement scholarship. So there is something to fight for,” added Marek Makuch.

Schools and students who participate in the program can count on the company’s extensive support. KGHM invites students to special events: competitions, lectures, and meetings with well-known experts, and provides equipment for school laboratories and classrooms. The students can use, among others, a room imitating a mine gallery, where they can train under the watchful eyes of instructors. The students can do internships at KGHM divisions and the best of them get scholarships.

In addition, a “Competent Pogchamp” is organized, among other things, which is a one-day sports tournament, and first and second grade students can try their hand at online gamification, which on the one hand allows them to get familiar the unique characteristics of KGHM’s operations, and on the other hand offers the opportunity to win attractive prizes.

For students who are joining the program this year, KGHM has prepared practical gadgets and onboarding meetings, during which they will learn more about internships and planned events, as well as about how to obtain a scholarship under the program.

Following the success of the “Competent” program, in 2023 KGHM launched another educational program for secondary school students from the Copper Belt and the Lubuskie Province called “Copper’s Digital Future.” The program is designed for students who are planning to study in fields related to information technologies and are currently attending technical secondary schools with classes with an IT profile or high schools with science profiles. The goal of the program is to support education in occupations where digital competencies are essential. The project is coordinated by the Central Information Processing Center (COPI), a division of KGHM.