Three hundred and seventy students from the Faculty of Science and Engineering (FSE) joined the internship programmes organized by the faculty’s Co-operative Education Centre (CEC) in the school year 2005-06. These students were participants of the Industrial Attachment Scheme (IAS) or Co-operative Education Scheme (CES) and were allocated to different local and mainland institutes to gain real job experience. Four participants from the Department of Electronic Engineering (EE) who took internships in DBS Bank presented what they had learned and their achievements on 28 August at the bank’s headquarters in Central.

The four EE students major in information technology. They are Derek Chiu Ying-kit and Simon Chung Chi-wa, both year-two students who joined the IAS; and Denis Wong Tsz-hok and Carrie Tam Ka-yi, final year students who joined the CES. During their days in DBS, they developed a number of effective computer programmes to assist various operations of the bank.

Derek created a resource management tool to help the bank properly process and record resource utilization of each department, while Simon developed a Smart Workstation that provided the bank employees with on-line training and the latest information in the banking sector. Denis and Carrie worked together to create a system that evaluated the significance of various DBS bank promotional activities.

The four interns agreed that they benefited substantially from the internship. Not only did they know about the demand in a real work environment, but also learned how to solve problems independently. Derek said that the internship showed him how a highly efficient workplace looked like. He was also motivated in self-learning and would strive for more knowledge.

Attending their presentation were such honorable guests as Sunny Cheung, Managing Director and Head of Consumer Banking for Greater China of DBS Bank; Professor Richard Ho Yan-ki, Vice-President (Undergraduate Education); Professor Chan Chi-hou, Dean of Faculty of Science and Engineering; Professor Paul Lam Kwan-Sing, Associate Dean of Faculty of Science and Engineering and Director of Co-operative Education Centre; Professor Ng Kai-tat, Deputy Director of Co-operative Education Centre; and many senior executives of DBS Bank.

Professor Ho was very pleased with the success of the students. “CEC’s work coincides with CityU’s mission to nurture students into professionals and give them opporotunities to practice what they have learned in real work environment. We highly appreciate the support from DBS and all the other participating institutions that provide these internship programmes for our students,” he said.

DBS commended the outstanding performance of the students. Their internship projects were adopted by the bank. DBS would also look forward to strengthening its collaboration with CityU.

In recent years, DBS has recruited many CityU graduates, some of whom had previously worked as interns in the bank by joining IAS or CES. The guests and CityU graduates took this opportunity for an alumni union.

Established over 4 years ago, CEC aimed at developing FSE students into professionals suitable for various sectors by offering them internship opportunities through IAS and CES, as a result, boosting their competitiveness and employability.

The CES offers the final-year FES students one year of real work experience during their study. They will have good chances to get job offers from the companies where they serve as interns with outstanding performance. For instance, over 70% of students were offered employment by the institutions after their completion of internship in 2004-05 school year.

The IAS is scheduled for June and August every year, to provide chances for year-two students to work in companies for 9 to 13 weeks.