TRU World Associate Vice-President Cyndi McLeod announced today that the university has won a significant training contract for the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing.

The project will send a team of instructional and project staff from Kamloops to Beijing to provide specialized training for 100 site managers from the China Network Communications Corporation. CNC is the largest telecom in China and the official telecommunications provider for the 2008 Olympic Games.

“We have been working on this proposal for more than six months,” said McLeod. “We’ve made two missions to China for direct discussions with CNC and to establish the curriculum design for what will be a highly customized program of instruction.”

The TRU team will deliver intensive courses in English as a Second Language, customer service, intercultural communications, as well as event support and emergency response. The entire program has been customized for telecommunications managers, and features specialized vocabulary and other course content specific to the internationalized delivery of voice, data, and other telecom services. Beginning this fall and continuing through March 2007, the training will be delivered in three intensive four-week modules.

The TRU project is an integral component of CNC’s preparations for the Summer Olympics, and the trainees will go on to serve as Telecommunications Customer Support Site Managers in Beijing.

“The Customer Support Site Managers will have a high level of responsibility,” explained McLeod. “They will act as ambassadors for CNC at 27 Olympic venues throughout China. The language and intercultural training that TRU will deliver is particularly important for the Site Managers as they will provide critical media and telecom support for their international customers and clients during the Games.

“We’re very pleased to have the opportunity to contribute to the Summer Games in Beijing, especially given that British Columbia will be hosting its own Olympics in 2010. This project is both a significant recognition of our training capabilities at TRU, and a chance to build some important international linkages for BC in the context of the Olympic movement.”

TRU was also recently shortlisted for a second Olympic-related training contract in China in the tourism and hospitality sector.

For more information, please contact Cyndi McLeod at 250-828-5191 or by email.