A new model of high-value engineering education

In the context of a historical review there seems a measure of consensus. I was also a beneficiary of a well-resourced apprenticeship from one of the largest players of the era, later delivering and managing such programmes. However unlike many others from this “Technician/IEng pathway”. I haven’t at any time in my career demonstrated all the attributes expected of a Chartered Engineer and I gradually diverged into related (and unrelated) management a few years after gaining IEng.


Opportunity presented to others in different ways, such as for example being prepared by a full-time university course before gaining relevant training and experience, that made CEng recognition a possibility before many also diverged into management.  There are others who passed CEI/Engineering Council/Institution Examinations, undertook work-based MSc programmes, or found a pathway to CEng in the last decade or so as more flexibility was applied using UK-SPEC.  All these various pathways (as Andy points out) should be equally worthy of respect. They lead to overlapping outcomes. 


I have been fortunate to meet very many engineers much more talented than myself, who I respect for their achievements. Unfortunately however, the divisions and categorisations that we have created in engineering, have led towards what often seems like petty one-upmanship and badge snobbery. Regulators legal or quasi-legal institutionalise this and just rigidly apply the rules they are given. Those who feel that the system has unfairly disadvantaged them naturally attack it. In practice Engineers on the whole, just get on with it and if what we do collectively benefits society, then respect will be earned.   

       

John seems to suggest that only specialised “consulting engineer" types should be CEng and not “managers”. This is a popular view amongst specialist engineers, since the conflation with management does cause confusion, as does the conflation with status. However, significant numbers of engineers aspire to and eventually become managers, with a broader generalist or strategic perspective. Should they be expelled or transferred to another category?

 

I picked on calculus in an earlier post because it is being used for selection and as a rite of passage. For example the US accreditation body ABET states.

 
“Engineering programs typically require additional, higher-level mathematics, including multiple semesters of calculus and calculus-based theoretical science courses, while engineering technology programs typically focus on algebra, trigonometry, applied calculus, and other courses that are more practical than theoretical in nature.”

 

Other countries aligned to the Washington Accord (including the UK) seem to be following a similar philosophy.  This creates a dichotomy between engineering practitioners, based on their aptitude and personal circumstances during their teenage years. It also sets in train an ongoing systematic disadvantage and negative bias against those deemed to have demonstrated “lower attainment” or crudely to be “less bright”.  At the age of selection (15-18) only a small minority will have gained any meaningful experience of engineering in practice, but those selected for and completing WA programmes will have been deemed to be winners of a selection competition.  This illustrates the well-recognised cultural bias that values “academic” attainments more highly than “vocational”.  Nearly all of the other effects and consequences that we have discussed at length in these forums are derived from this assumption and seem to me primarily sociological in nature.


If we consider practitioners who have gained a combination of around 6-8 years of learning, experience and independent practice then we might expect them to be on the threshold of demonstrating “registration”.  This has been a generally accepted rule of thumb timeline for many decades, across a range of professions. It is also necessary to set a generally recognised knowledge reference point and I see no viable alternative (for cultural reasons) to that being set at the level of a Bachelors Degree. The Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education, regulator of university degrees in the UK does not recognise a difference in level between “Engineering” and “Engineering Technology” and many employers also find no useful difference. 

 

MEng degrees add a further year of study and are more WA aligned. However only a few employers, see this extra year and more academic early emphasis as a significant benefit. Many of those who do just use it as a recruitment filter, along with other techniques like psychometric tests and assessment centres.  Typically a high proportion move fairly quickly into management type roles.  I’m sorry that this link is to a commercial organisation but if you scroll down to the first graph “3. Levels of work and an array of growth curves” . This Career Path Appreciation methodology explains. When I googled it there was also an academic research study (J Kitching 2006).   http://bioss.com/gillian-stamp/the-individual-the-organisation-and-the-path-to-mutual-appreciation/  

 

Is anyone aware of any research studies , perhaps conducted along “double-blind” principles that have correlate the professional  performance of experienced practitioners against these different preparatory pathways, including the blend of concurrent formal learning and real world experience that is an higher/degree level apprenticeship?  The continuum that I posted earlier (http://www.rit.edu/emcs/admissions/images/stories/assorted/engineering/eng-vs-engtech.gif) seems a reasonable hypothesis to me.

 

All pathways will have a “drop-out rate” and arguably the higher it is, the more “elite” are the eventual successes. However should not the duty of any system of recognition provided for public benefit be to enable the “typical” not the “exceptional” to be appropriately recognised. Should not current performance also be the predominant factor? Public good is likely to be better served by more Engineers and Technicians (or “Technologists”) meeting appropriately challenging minimum standards and participating actively in a regulated community. Hopefully, most will continue to develop in ways appropriate to their circumstances and motivation, perhaps leading to an “advanced” form of recognition, which is where many in the Engineering Council family seek to position Chartered Engineer now.    

 

John, I liked your forward looking response to Alastair, but your historic grievance is not particularly relevant to the topic. It was other organisations that allegedly wronged you and in the case of professional registration the buck stops with Engineering Council. I am not commenting here on behalf of the IET, although I am very much involved. As I see it, we provide a service to all members under our license from Engineering Council. We would not tolerate “backdoors”, “black-balling” or any other unethical practices.  However, I can not deny that risks exist, that misconduct may never have occurred, or that what we have is working optimally to achieve its aims. In fact I’m trying here to improve it for the future, as I hope are you and other contributors.

 

I agree with Andy’s comment about “bar room opinions” , although such exchanges have a useful place , to shake up complacency and offer light relief. We also need in a UK context to keep very firmly in our minds that people volunteer to engage in professional recognition. Currently a huge number of them, don’t even want to walk into the bar, for many reasons, including because they don’t see anyone like them, think that it is too expensive, boring, full of snobs, self-important or self-serving people. The IET has actively sought to move away from this image and has become the most diverse member of the “Engineering Council Family”.  My challenge now would be can the “big three” (IET,ICE & IMechE), Universities, Colleges and Employers chart a more attractive, clearer and fairer path forward for Engineer and Technician recognition.  

 

A “red line” for me is the ending of systematic unfair disadvantage and even “stigma” (Mark Carne-CEO Network Rail)  towards those who travel the Apprenticeship pathway. Shame on those leaders and regulators of our profession who contributed to this stigma!

 

How many industry leaders cut investment in training, starved technical colleges and expected job-ready graduates from university?  How often have we been subjected to “leaders” of the profession bemoaning the lack of status of Engineering and denigrating those who weren’t members of their “technological elite”, for daring to call themselves “Engineers”?

 

Getting off the bar stool,  I had the opportunity recently to take “the long view” by meeting some grandchildren of one of our great early members, who developed from a 10 year old foundry boy, to membership of the big 3 UK learned societies and an international reputation. A contemporary of Edison who he was compared to in a European context. Both developed from humble beginnings via a combination of curiosity, collaboration, practical inventiveness and theoretical learning in increments when needed.  The lives of millions were improved by these engineers, their collaborators and by many other engineers of the era, who were held in great respect and admiration (i.e. Status).   

 

My proposal is that to emphasise the practical “applied” nature of engineering. We should normalise prospective engineers getting a strong grounding in relevant practice and basic (Technician type) principles, before preferably developing on to bachelors level, with a blend of mutually reinforcing learning and practice to degree level.  This fundamental training could be either employer or education led, but run as a partnership. Four years is a sensible period, with a Technician training stream offering a different (but equally valid) balance of knowledge and skills. such prgrammes don’t have to be “one size fits all” in emphasis. According to aptitude, opportunity and motivation, some may benefit form more academic “stretch” and progress post initial training on to higher degrees and other forms of lifelong learning.  

 

The current model of building theory before applying practice later, works well for university administrators and  fits certain cultural expectations, but it is less efficient both economically and as a learning methodology. It distorts equality of opportunity, disadvantages and excludes those of good potential, but with differently balanced aptitudes and patterns of growth.  It has also been allowed to create an advantage in professional recognition for some, that is not necessarily justified by their relative performance to others. I don’t seek to damage this pattern of preparation for those who want it, or to deny the obvious benefits of an educational experience, but it is hugely expensive,  not optimally efficient and not currently producing enough people well enough matched to the demand for skills. There is at least the positive side effect of opportunities for skilled migrants.  

 

From a social policy perspective perhaps, making a meaningful economic contribution earlier can mitigate the need to keep extending retirement benefit ages. My proposal is not clever or new, it is obvious. The beneficiaries of this approach are occupying senior professional and director level roles, having been economically productive from the age of 18 (or even 16). Most however have eschewed professional institutions, who sadly treated their pattern of development as second class!         

 

As is obvious this is a personal view, the IET has a campaign here  https://workexperience.theiet.org/our-manifesto/  which I’m not involved in, but support, albeit that I’m looking for something bigger and bolder at strategic level.  It took government action to revive degree apprenticeships on any scale. It may need more to ensure that the pathway is fairly valued.   

 

The fact that John has been allowed freedom of expression, except where it infringes on the rights and dignity of others, reflects well in my opinion on The IET, as does the tolerance of my “independent” position despite being a servant of the institution.  I think the intent of this thread was to look forward and there is a lot of thought in it, if you include some of the links such as the conference proceedings. I hope that people are not discouraged from reading it and forming their own opinion by John’s “campaign for personal vindication” which is a different issue.     

   

In the context of a historical review there seems a measure of consensus. I was also a beneficiary of a well-resourced apprenticeship from one of the largest players of the era, later delivering and managing such programmes. However unlike many others from this “Technician/IEng pathway”. I haven’t at any time in my career demonstrated all the attributes expected of a Chartered Engineer and I gradually diverged into related (and unrelated) management a few years after gaining IEng.


Opportunity presented to others in different ways, such as for example being prepared by a full-time university course before gaining relevant training and experience, that made CEng recognition a possibility before many also diverged into management.  There are others who passed CEI/Engineering Council/Institution Examinations, undertook work-based MSc programmes, or found a pathway to CEng in the last decade or so as more flexibility was applied using UK-SPEC.  All these various pathways (as Andy points out) should be equally worthy of respect. They lead to overlapping outcomes. 


I have been fortunate to meet very many engineers much more talented than myself, who I respect for their achievements. Unfortunately however, the divisions and categorisations that we have created in engineering, have led towards what often seems like petty one-upmanship and badge snobbery. Regulators legal or quasi-legal institutionalise this and just rigidly apply the rules they are given. Those who feel that the system has unfairly disadvantaged them naturally attack it. In practice Engineers on the whole, just get on with it and if what we do collectively benefits society, then respect will be earned.   

       

John seems to suggest that only specialised “consulting engineer" types should be CEng and not “managers”. This is a popular view amongst specialist engineers, since the conflation with management does cause confusion, as does the conflation with status. However, significant numbers of engineers aspire to and eventually become managers, with a broader generalist or strategic perspective. Should they be expelled or transferred to another category?

 

I picked on calculus in an earlier post because it is being used for selection and as a rite of passage. For example the US accreditation body ABET states.

 
“Engineering programs typically require additional, higher-level mathematics, including multiple semesters of calculus and calculus-based theoretical science courses, while engineering technology programs typically focus on algebra, trigonometry, applied calculus, and other courses that are more practical than theoretical in nature.”

 

Other countries aligned to the Washington Accord (including the UK) seem to be following a similar philosophy.  This creates a dichotomy between engineering practitioners, based on their aptitude and personal circumstances during their teenage years. It also sets in train an ongoing systematic disadvantage and negative bias against those deemed to have demonstrated “lower attainment” or crudely to be “less bright”.  At the age of selection (15-18) only a small minority will have gained any meaningful experience of engineering in practice, but those selected for and completing WA programmes will have been deemed to be winners of a selection competition.  This illustrates the well-recognised cultural bias that values “academic” attainments more highly than “vocational”.  Nearly all of the other effects and consequences that we have discussed at length in these forums are derived from this assumption and seem to me primarily sociological in nature.


If we consider practitioners who have gained a combination of around 6-8 years of learning, experience and independent practice then we might expect them to be on the threshold of demonstrating “registration”.  This has been a generally accepted rule of thumb timeline for many decades, across a range of professions. It is also necessary to set a generally recognised knowledge reference point and I see no viable alternative (for cultural reasons) to that being set at the level of a Bachelors Degree. The Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education, regulator of university degrees in the UK does not recognise a difference in level between “Engineering” and “Engineering Technology” and many employers also find no useful difference. 

 

MEng degrees add a further year of study and are more WA aligned. However only a few employers, see this extra year and more academic early emphasis as a significant benefit. Many of those who do just use it as a recruitment filter, along with other techniques like psychometric tests and assessment centres.  Typically a high proportion move fairly quickly into management type roles.  I’m sorry that this link is to a commercial organisation but if you scroll down to the first graph “3. Levels of work and an array of growth curves” . This Career Path Appreciation methodology explains. When I googled it there was also an academic research study (J Kitching 2006).   http://bioss.com/gillian-stamp/the-individual-the-organisation-and-the-path-to-mutual-appreciation/  

 

Is anyone aware of any research studies , perhaps conducted along “double-blind” principles that have correlate the professional  performance of experienced practitioners against these different preparatory pathways, including the blend of concurrent formal learning and real world experience that is an higher/degree level apprenticeship?  The continuum that I posted earlier (http://www.rit.edu/emcs/admissions/images/stories/assorted/engineering/eng-vs-engtech.gif) seems a reasonable hypothesis to me.

 

All pathways will have a “drop-out rate” and arguably the higher it is, the more “elite” are the eventual successes. However should not the duty of any system of recognition provided for public benefit be to enable the “typical” not the “exceptional” to be appropriately recognised. Should not current performance also be the predominant factor? Public good is likely to be better served by more Engineers and Technicians (or “Technologists”) meeting appropriately challenging minimum standards and participating actively in a regulated community. Hopefully, most will continue to develop in ways appropriate to their circumstances and motivation, perhaps leading to an “advanced” form of recognition, which is where many in the Engineering Council family seek to position Chartered Engineer now.    

 

John, I liked your forward looking response to Alastair, but your historic grievance is not particularly relevant to the topic. It was other organisations that allegedly wronged you and in the case of professional registration the buck stops with Engineering Council. I am not commenting here on behalf of the IET, although I am very much involved. As I see it, we provide a service to all members under our license from Engineering Council. We would not tolerate “backdoors”, “black-balling” or any other unethical practices.  However, I can not deny that risks exist, that misconduct may never have occurred, or that what we have is working optimally to achieve its aims. In fact I’m trying here to improve it for the future, as I hope are you and other contributors.

 

I agree with Andy’s comment about “bar room opinions” , although such exchanges have a useful place , to shake up complacency and offer light relief. We also need in a UK context to keep very firmly in our minds that people volunteer to engage in professional recognition. Currently a huge number of them, don’t even want to walk into the bar, for many reasons, including because they don’t see anyone like them, think that it is too expensive, boring, full of snobs, self-important or self-serving people. The IET has actively sought to move away from this image and has become the most diverse member of the “Engineering Council Family”.  My challenge now would be can the “big three” (IET,ICE & IMechE), Universities, Colleges and Employers chart a more attractive, clearer and fairer path forward for Engineer and Technician recognition.  

 

A “red line” for me is the ending of systematic unfair disadvantage and even “stigma” (Mark Carne-CEO Network Rail)  towards those who travel the Apprenticeship pathway. Shame on those leaders and regulators of our profession who contributed to this stigma!

 

How many industry leaders cut investment in training, starved technical colleges and expected job-ready graduates from university?  How often have we been subjected to “leaders” of the profession bemoaning the lack of status of Engineering and denigrating those who weren’t members of their “technological elite”, for daring to call themselves “Engineers”?

 

Getting off the bar stool,  I had the opportunity recently to take “the long view” by meeting some grandchildren of one of our great early members, who developed from a 10 year old foundry boy, to membership of the big 3 UK learned societies and an international reputation. A contemporary of Edison who he was compared to in a European context. Both developed from humble beginnings via a combination of curiosity, collaboration, practical inventiveness and theoretical learning in increments when needed.  The lives of millions were improved by these engineers, their collaborators and by many other engineers of the era, who were held in great respect and admiration (i.e. Status).   

 

My proposal is that to emphasise the practical “applied” nature of engineering. We should normalise prospective engineers getting a strong grounding in relevant practice and basic (Technician type) principles, before preferably developing on to bachelors level, with a blend of mutually reinforcing learning and practice to degree level.  This fundamental training could be either employer or education led, but run as a partnership. Four years is a sensible period, with a Technician training stream offering a different (but equally valid) balance of knowledge and skills. such prgrammes don’t have to be “one size fits all” in emphasis. According to aptitude, opportunity and motivation, some may benefit form more academic “stretch” and progress post initial training on to higher degrees and other forms of lifelong learning.  

 

The current model of building theory before applying practice later, works well for university administrators and  fits certain cultural expectations, but it is less efficient both economically and as a learning methodology. It distorts equality of opportunity, disadvantages and excludes those of good potential, but with differently balanced aptitudes and patterns of growth.  It has also been allowed to create an advantage in professional recognition for some, that is not necessarily justified by their relative performance to others. I don’t seek to damage this pattern of preparation for those who want it, or to deny the obvious benefits of an educational experience, but it is hugely expensive,  not optimally efficient and not currently producing enough people well enough matched to the demand for skills. There is at least the positive side effect of opportunities for skilled migrants.  

 

From a social policy perspective perhaps, making a meaningful economic contribution earlier can mitigate the need to keep extending retirement benefit ages. My proposal is not clever or new, it is obvious. The beneficiaries of this approach are occupying senior professional and director level roles, having been economically productive from the age of 18 (or even 16). Most however have eschewed professional institutions, who sadly treated their pattern of development as second class!         

 

As is obvious this is a personal view, the IET has a campaign here  https://workexperience.theiet.org/our-manifesto/  which I’m not involved in, but support, albeit that I’m looking for something bigger and bolder at strategic level.  It took government action to revive degree apprenticeships on any scale. It may need more to ensure that the pathway is fairly valued.   

 

The fact that John has been allowed freedom of expression, except where it infringes on the rights and dignity of others, reflects well in my opinion on The IET, as does the tolerance of my “independent” position despite being a servant of the institution.  I think the intent of this thread was to look forward and there is a lot of thought in it, if you include some of the links such as the conference proceedings. I hope that people are not discouraged from reading it and forming their own opinion by John’s “campaign for personal vindication” which is a different issue.