Pioneering Past and Bright of Impactful Research and Scholarly Achievements

“EXCELLENCE THROUGH KNOWLEDGE” P A G E 94 Toward Capacity Building for a Sustainable Energy Sector in the Caribbean: Training Needs of Students at the University of Technology, Jamaica Dependence on imported petroleum to meet their energy needs makes it imperative that Jamaica and other countries in the Caribbean region diversify their energy mix with renewable sources such as solar, wind, biomass, hydro, and geothermal. Having the right mix of relevant skills available among personnel working in the energy sector is a key requirement in achieving this objective. This paper reports the results of a needs analysis survey conducted using a mixed method (quantitative and qualitative) approach among final year students at the University of Technology, Jamaica (UTech, Ja.) to ascertain their knowledge of energy innovation, entrepreneurship, and related thematic areas. The respondents reported high levels of unawareness of most of the key energy innovation, entrepreneurship, and related thematic areas, such as knowledge and technology transfer; intellectual property (IP) rights; IPevaluation (evaluating research results for innovation value); IP commercialization; IP and business strategy; research and development contracts; innovation management; and use of patent databases. These results provide a strong evidentiary basis for targetted curricula and other interventions to address the identified knowledge gaps, so that graduates of the University will have the capacity for effective knowledge transfer and the capability to develop and apply innovative solutions and modern technologies to diversify the energy mix of Jamaica and other Caribbean countries. Margarene Spence 1 , Paul Ivey 2 , Ruth Potopsingh 1 1 Caribbean Sustainable Energy & Innovation Institute 2 School of Graduate Studies, Research & Entrepreneurship University of Technology, Jamaica Editor’s Note: This research was published in full in the Journal of Arts Science & Technology. Volume 8, 98:112, 2015. Margarene Spence Paul Ivey RuthPotopsingh