The number of newly registered incorporated engineers continues to decline. The strategy of the Engineering Council is clearly not aligned to supporting the engineering technologist professional. Given the governments commitment to technical education the IET should create their own professional register to provide a relevant standard. It is obvious the current UKSPEC standard lacks credibility in terms of the IEng grade
Roy Bowdler, interesting food for thought. I do take all of your well made points and I think what you suggest is definitely worthy of exploration and could very possibly be a good solution. I still feel there is a pretty clear distinction in the definition - especially the innovation focus - between the two classes of registration, but do accept that there are overlaps, and that, in many cases, employers are less focused on that distinction - even if they understand it. Many C.Eng are inhibited by their industry from operating at any more than I.Eng approaches (selecting from a number of tried and tested solutions), especially the sector in which both Andy Millar and I are currently pursuing, rail, though, like him, I do seek to go against the tide in this respect. But I feel there are also a good number of roles and employers where the distinction is important, and they, in particular, and the people who work in, or seek to work in those roles, would benefit from continuing the distinction. Maybe both approaches need to be examined far more closely alongside each other and evaluated for pros and cons. However, as we are all strongly concluding, the problem is the general lack of understanding it perception of these distinctions or, worse still, that it is not necessarily a matter of better/worse or seniority both amongst employers and potential registrants. We either need to turn that round or, if the problem is far too huge and established to turn round, then that would be, in itself, to go with Roy's suggested approach, though we definitely need to ensure that it's not just a technician or engineer distinction, as that takes us too far the other way - we don't only avoid overlap, we create a chasm. I think that could be an excellent reason to develop his concept of Master Technician, even if that wasn't what he had in mind initially. One final thought though - if this change is to be pursued, before we even get to educating employers and candidates to the changes, how, if at all, do we pull the other PEIs along with us?
Roy Bowdler, interesting food for thought. I do take all of your well made points and I think what you suggest is definitely worthy of exploration and could very possibly be a good solution. I still feel there is a pretty clear distinction in the definition - especially the innovation focus - between the two classes of registration, but do accept that there are overlaps, and that, in many cases, employers are less focused on that distinction - even if they understand it. Many C.Eng are inhibited by their industry from operating at any more than I.Eng approaches (selecting from a number of tried and tested solutions), especially the sector in which both Andy Millar and I are currently pursuing, rail, though, like him, I do seek to go against the tide in this respect. But I feel there are also a good number of roles and employers where the distinction is important, and they, in particular, and the people who work in, or seek to work in those roles, would benefit from continuing the distinction. Maybe both approaches need to be examined far more closely alongside each other and evaluated for pros and cons. However, as we are all strongly concluding, the problem is the general lack of understanding it perception of these distinctions or, worse still, that it is not necessarily a matter of better/worse or seniority both amongst employers and potential registrants. We either need to turn that round or, if the problem is far too huge and established to turn round, then that would be, in itself, to go with Roy's suggested approach, though we definitely need to ensure that it's not just a technician or engineer distinction, as that takes us too far the other way - we don't only avoid overlap, we create a chasm. I think that could be an excellent reason to develop his concept of Master Technician, even if that wasn't what he had in mind initially. One final thought though - if this change is to be pursued, before we even get to educating employers and candidates to the changes, how, if at all, do we pull the other PEIs along with us?
