And a problem I see in this very useful discussion, following on from Roy P's post, is that it's only involving those in or very aware of the PEIs. And by "this discussion" I don't just mean this thread, it's the whole discussion about registration. In my presentation yesterday there was a really good question raised at about 10 minutes in: "you're talking about the Engineering Council and UK-SPEC, who are they, I've never heard of them before, and what is this spec about?" For actual engineers they don't know, or care about the minutiae, they've just found that they've hit a potential glass ceiling without getting registration, they just want to know what they need to do to get it. Yes of course there needs to be a continuing internal debate to ensure that UK-SPEC and (taking Roy B's point) the demonstration process for UK&U are a valid and reliable measure of whatever we're trying to measure. But there's a separate issue of checking with the outside world that we are making process of achieving registration to whatever standard is agreed clear and accessible to candidates.


It's a delicate and complicated balance. The EC and PEIs do need to maintain a standard: taking it to ridiculous extremes there would be no long term benefit for anyone if they took a populist approach and instantly awarded CEng to everyone with a qualification with the word engineering in it. But equally they are there to deliver a service to the market, again there is no long - or short - term benefit to them deciding in isolation a set of completely random criteria and then defending them to the hilt. And both forces are clearly at play.


My instinct is, but like everyone I'm going to have my own biases:

1. The standards themselves are really not that far off a useful and defendable service to industry and the wider public.

2. The routes to achieving the standards are still too opaque for many engineers and their managers.  

3. There is not yet a good enough understanding of point 2 in the registration community, and much better engagement with the non-PEI world is needed.

4. Off topic, but it keeps coming up in this thread: Yes there is a lot of arrogance and elitism in engineering, but it's not located in any one group: it could be simplified to the idea that every engineer thinks that the route they followed is the one true route and everyone who followed a different route is incompetent! That's human beings for you...

(5. As we've all discussed to death over several years and it's for the other thread, the majority of people inside and outside the PEIs don't realise how valuable IEng and EngTEch potentially are!!!)


Thanks,


Andy

And a problem I see in this very useful discussion, following on from Roy P's post, is that it's only involving those in or very aware of the PEIs. And by "this discussion" I don't just mean this thread, it's the whole discussion about registration. In my presentation yesterday there was a really good question raised at about 10 minutes in: "you're talking about the Engineering Council and UK-SPEC, who are they, I've never heard of them before, and what is this spec about?" For actual engineers they don't know, or care about the minutiae, they've just found that they've hit a potential glass ceiling without getting registration, they just want to know what they need to do to get it. Yes of course there needs to be a continuing internal debate to ensure that UK-SPEC and (taking Roy B's point) the demonstration process for UK&U are a valid and reliable measure of whatever we're trying to measure. But there's a separate issue of checking with the outside world that we are making process of achieving registration to whatever standard is agreed clear and accessible to candidates.


It's a delicate and complicated balance. The EC and PEIs do need to maintain a standard: taking it to ridiculous extremes there would be no long term benefit for anyone if they took a populist approach and instantly awarded CEng to everyone with a qualification with the word engineering in it. But equally they are there to deliver a service to the market, again there is no long - or short - term benefit to them deciding in isolation a set of completely random criteria and then defending them to the hilt. And both forces are clearly at play.


My instinct is, but like everyone I'm going to have my own biases:

1. The standards themselves are really not that far off a useful and defendable service to industry and the wider public.

2. The routes to achieving the standards are still too opaque for many engineers and their managers.  

3. There is not yet a good enough understanding of point 2 in the registration community, and much better engagement with the non-PEI world is needed.

4. Off topic, but it keeps coming up in this thread: Yes there is a lot of arrogance and elitism in engineering, but it's not located in any one group: it could be simplified to the idea that every engineer thinks that the route they followed is the one true route and everyone who followed a different route is incompetent! That's human beings for you...

(5. As we've all discussed to death over several years and it's for the other thread, the majority of people inside and outside the PEIs don't realise how valuable IEng and EngTEch potentially are!!!)


Thanks,


Andy