The Corporate Training Services Business Line combines Training Delivery and Services (TDS) with The Energy Online Learning Center (OLC) to deliver courses which support the department’s mission programs. The benefits to the DOE include: DOE specific courses, competitive pricing, and fee for service pricing. This new business will continue the goals of the Professional Skills Training and the OLC to focus on customer requirements and develop course offerings that serve the evolving needs of the Department’s program missions.
The (OLC) is a web-based training commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) system that provides access to online learning and training. The goal of this effort is to use technology to deliver learning activities to the desktop wherever such delivery can be demonstrated to improve learning outcomes and reduce costs independently or in combination with other training methods.
The OLC resides on a server located at the vendor’s (Meridian KSI, Inc.) office location. The OLC offers a large inventory of courses. Over 678 self-paced business, management, and leadership courses, over 1,138 information technology courses and over 200 technical courses have been made available. These courses are procured through a Memorandum of Agreement (MOA) with the U.S. Department of the Treasury FedSource San Antonio. FedSource San Antonio negotiated a contract with the course vendors SkillSoft and NetG and utilizes the National Security Agency to act as the distributor to obtain commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) online courses for Federal agencies at a reduced cost. There are also some DOE-specific courses that have been made available to employees. Additional DOE courses will be posted on the OLC in the future.
In addition to online learning, the OLC offers other training related functions that include an administration function allowing the user to have access to transcript information consisting of a list of courses accessed, courses completed, credit hours earned, test scores and course evaluations. There is also a reporting capability, sorted by organization, of employee training related data and information. Other functions of the OLC offer knowledge management capabilities such as technical papers, presentations, videos, DOE standards and guidelines, reference materials and information and other learning materials.
Employees have access via the Internet to OLC courses and other functions for a full year. Employees can access unlimited courses as many times as needed during the year. Customers enjoy the convenience of completing learning activities on demand.
Fixed Base Costs are related to contractor support in managing the content and operation of the website that controls access to the online learning and training. Variable Costs are related to the direct costs of subscriptions. The business line may negotiate fees with customer organizations to prepare curriculum material or convert material to make is usable as part of the OLC system.
Customers are billed a fixed annual cost allocated to participating DOE organizations based on the respective percentage usage of the amount of subscriptions utilized by each program customer in the prior fiscal year, in addition to subscription cost per user for course access. The business line is also authorized to negotiate agreements with customers to prepare course materials for inclusion in the Center.
Fixed costs and initial subscriptions will be billed in October. Subsequent subscriptions will be billed quarterly.
The budget is determined by using historical data for the most recent fiscal year with additions or subtractions to account for any changes in the pricing policy that affect the budget year. Business costs that are charged to customers include fixed charges and variable subscription charges. Fixed charges are allocated to customer budgets based on the respective percentage usage of the amount of subscriptions utilized by each program customer in the prior fiscal year.
Fixed charges occur once and customer subscriptions cannot be anticipated, so cost projections in the current fiscal year are equal to cumulative spending to-date for each customer account.
Objectives for this business are in the format of a balanced scorecard.
For more information on these objectives and business line performance measures please view the OLC Five-year Plan.
The OLC customer base includes all federal employees. The OLC will provide high quality, standardized, cost-effective learning opportunities on a real time basis to employees. Some of the expected benefits are as follows:
The Professional Skills and Technical Training directly supports the accomplishment of the DOE Strategic Plan and the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board (DNFSB) recommendations. It is a key element of DOE’s Corporate Approach to Training.
These services include: the design, development, and delivery of competency-based courses to meet critical skill development needs in Project Management, Program Management, and Acquisition and Assistance Management. A series of Continuing Education courses has been added to present new topics and refresher training. Program offerings include modular course design, and customized, just-in-time training, for on-site and centralized delivery. The Program has a twenty-year track record of providing professional training and training services throughout the DOE complex.
Training Management services are offered to customers on a negotiated basis only.
Costs for this business are related to the management of professional skills training as well as course development and delivery. Most costs are specifically associated with a single course offering.
Customers are billed a flat charge of $100/day for each day of the course delivery. The business line is also authorized to negotiate agreements with customers to prepare course materials for inclusion in training management services.
Costs are billed to customers in the month those costs are incurred.
In its first year of operations budget estimates were based on customer participation in the Professional Skills Training Pilot that was tested in FY 2003 with known training management service requirements.
Customer projections in each month’s WCF bill are based on actual activity during the previous months of the current year.
DOE Training is a highly competitive environment with university and other institutional programs, government and private training vendors, and other online training facilities. Participation in the Online Learning Center and Training Delivery and Services is entirely voluntary for our program customers.
Points of Contact
Business Line Manager:
For more information, customers are invited to visit the On-Line Learning Center web site at http://www.energyolc.com and the Office of Training and Human Resource Development web site at http://ma.mbe.doe.gov/ME50/Training/index.htm.
Q. How would a program customer estimate its OLC funding requirement?
A. The Office of the Administrator, EIA, had 200 users in FY 2003, which correlates to 4.9% of total users. That percentage of the fixed costs of $109K is $5,341.
In FY04, EIA decides to have 100 users with access to OLC, all of them having SkillSoft access and 40 of them having access to NetG in addition to SkillSoft. The course costs would be:
100 x $35/user = $3,500
40 x $40/user = $1,600
The total annual cost for this level of usage would be $5,100.
Q. Can Field personnel participate in Online Learning?
A. The Online Learning is available to Field personnel. If the training officer at the field site determines that a DOE employee in the field would benefit from this training opportunity, they can access Online Learning by way of the same subscription process available to headquarters. A funding mechanism has been developed to facilitate field use of the Working Capital Fund for Online Learning and it is described in the preceding section titled “Billing”.