Natalia Ionova, head of human resources at Russian steelmaker Evraz, used the recession of 2008 to focus and unify the training of mine managers in their facilities worldwide. With Moscow School of Management Skolkovo, she developed an executive education programme, vital for giving managers an understanding of the company as a whole.

"The people on the courses know the company from the inside, so they can share experiences, and the programmes give them the tools to develop ideas and implement innovative solutions," says Ionova. "It’s better than hiring MBA graduates from outside."

The Republic reports that Massey Energy will stop production at Randolph Mine in West Virginia mine for three days to retrain workers after the operation was cited for a string of serious MSHA safety violations. "We were disappointed in the results of last week's MSHA inspection and I ordered this stand down to reinforce safe mining practices and provide additional training in safety, ventilation and the requirements of our mine plan," Massey Chief Executive Baxter Phillips said in a statement.

Mining explosives supplier Bulk Mining Explosives (BME) director Tony Rorke told Mining Weekly that unless South Africa makes a serious investment towards improving their blasting training, millions of rands per year will continue to be wasted in lost productivity.

...intensive investment in training and the use of new blasting technologies are needed if opencast mining operators are to take full advantage of the booming commodities market over the next few years. Effective blasting, probably the most crucial aspect of opencast mining, is largely being neglected as operators, accustomed to the results they are getting, do not examine the opportunities available to them to increase their outputs.

TAFE Western has opened three new facilities in Orange, NSW, Australia to provide students with state of the art training in trades and mining, set in a framework of green technology and green building practices.

TAFE Western institute director Kate Baxter said both the Green Skills Trade Education Centre and the mining simulator would provide world-class learning facilities right here in Orange. She said the Green Skills Trade Education Centre would train tradespeople in a range of areas including plumbing, construction, electrotechnology, manufacturing and engineering, and aimed to develop sustainable building practices.

A report handed to Australian Education and Training Minister Chris Evans warns that Australia will fail to capitalise on the mining boom unless it overhauls the national training system and improves workforce skill levels.

Under current arrangements, completion rates are appalling, training often poorly targeted, graduate skills under-used and skill shortages growing, the report says. Meanwhile, at least 1.5 million people are unemployed or under-employed and nearly half the population has poor language, literacy and numeracy skills.

Connected with the Annual Meeting of the European Federation of Geologists (EFG) this year in Budapest will be a workshop on "Geology at different education levels in Europe" on May 19th. A fieldtrip to the Balaton Lake and the Bakony-Balaton Geopark will also be also offered the following day, including a visit to the area of the catastrophic red sludge spill.

Wayne Swan has rejected calls for a large boost to permanent migration. Instead, he claims that his budget will create 500,000 new jobs and drive unemployment to 4.5 per cent. Short-term shortages in the mining and other industries can be met through temporary skilled migration, he argues, but permanent skilled migration is not the way to go.

"I don't see the need for a dramatic increase in permanent skilled migration," Mr Swan told The Courier-Mail. "I think what we have to do in the first instance is train Australians."

In an effort to include nontechnical, or soft skills, as part of its new approach to education in mining engineering, the University of Pretoria’s Department of Mining Engineering reports it is currently in the final stage of converting all its undergraduate paper-based mining subjects to instructionally designed modules. These modules will consist of electronic, interactive course notes including videos, animations, photos, mouse-overs and cross-links to improve students’ abilities to acquire and apply their knowledge of the mining industry.

The inclusion of nontechnical skills, which are currently being incorporated as part of the curriculum for the mining subjects, will assist students in better understanding the complexities of mining and can improve their chances of success in the industry.

Navigator Project Finance is presenting a two-day Excel-based modelling course for mining projects at various locations around Australia: Perth, Sydney and London this summer, and Brisbane and Perth this fall.

Attend this... course if you are involved in the management, development or appraisal of mining projects. It covers the core Excel and Scenario skills required to efficiently and professionally analyse, communicate and update the progress of a mining project. This course is presented by Navigator’s experienced mining project modellers and is focused on how a project finance banker or external party would analyse your project. This knowledge empowers you to create sensitivity and scenario framework that will hold up to the scrutiny of these stakeholders.