CONTRIBUTION TO MARINE ELECTRICAL ENGINEERING AND INFORMATION TECHNOLOGIES CURRICULUM

This paper deals with improving the curriculum for the Marine Electrical Engineering and Information Technologies Department at the Faculty of Maritime Studies in Split, with a particular focus on the master level. While the BSc level is defined by the STCW 7.03 (lower level) and 7.08 (higher level) requirements, the MSc level structure is largely blurred. So, finding a right niche in the labor market ashore should be the goal of the curriculum improvements. It is important to assist the 3 year program students in finding shorebased jobs by introducing adjustments to the current curriculum. Nowadays, it is not expected that any one will remain aboard for the entire work life. It is more natural to keep developing various skills and, at some point, start working ashore at private or government agencies / services, possibly in the area of inspection, education, logistics, fleet management or other related professions. For electrotechnical officers (ETOs) it is even possible to find work in the fields that are not directly related to marine technologies, but rather to the electrical know-how. A new curriculum for the master level should enable such engagements but also, at the same time, it should avoid parallelism problems with pure electrical engineering studies at similar higher education institutions, e.g. electrical engineering faculties. One of the fields that lack skilled employees is the IT and software industry. When dealing with software requirements, the ability to function in different working and business environments should be an imperative in future traffic applications. These skills will also help in finding jobs in shore-based and IT businesses. The paper presents a workflow of the plans to change the curriculum for the Marine Electrical Engineering and Information Technologies (MEEIT) Department in order to position MEng of MEEIT clearly at the EU labor market.