Should Electrical Tutors at FE colleges in the UK be mandated to complete a minimum of 1 week per year working in industry?

Fair point, in my experience yes, at FE almost entirely. However of course that doesn't mean they are up to date...we really want students to come out of college more up to date than their employers, not less (which can happen if their tutors are teaching them what they did when they left industry 10-20 years earlier).   

Another reason for the Enhances CPD for the FE Tutors to stay up to date and meet the requirement of EAS (IET's Electrotechnical Assessment Specification)

Sergio Fernandez said:

Valid point but if the industry does nothing the natural attrition will occur anyway. 

True, but what do we mean by "the industry"? Practically (in the UK at least) the industry is a huge collection of individual companies each of whom are trying to survive year by year. I've certainly in the past been in discussions with groups of companies where they all agree that "something should be done" about FE, but none of them individually has the funds or time to do anything. And if any group - whether an industry collective or government - proposed to require companies to support FE in terms of either money or time or both I'm sure there would be an outcry on these forums ("I'm barely turning a profit as it is, I can't afford to pay that!"). Not that I'm saying that would be the wrong approach - personally as someone vaguely left of centre I'd like to see more government support for FE along with the consequent tax increases somewhere, but as the ballot boxes have shown very many wouldn't for reasons I quite understand. There's no easy answer, but the question needs to start from the point of view that practically there is no collective of "the industry" when it comes to these issues.

Sergio Fernandez said:

FE colleges need to pay higher salary to the Electrical tutors and give them a better package than what is currently offered in the UK as a whole which must include the backend managerial support.

As others have said here and as my response above - in principle may be true, but begs the question of where that money is coming from. (Incidentally, I don't know if it's still true, but I seem to remember from 15-20 years ago when I was more involved in these worlds that FE was rather better paid than HE! Not to say that FE was paid well, but HE was paid appallingly.) 

Andy Millar said:

However of course that doesn't mean they are up to date...we really want students to come out of college more up to date than their employers, not less (which can happen if their tutors are teaching them what they did when they left industry 10-20 years earlier

Agreed but someone will need to have a searching look at the syllabus for many courses. Take the 2391 practical assessment, for example. The rigs today are exactly the same as they were when the course was introduced many years ago. Not even lip service paid to EV, PV, batteries, smart home technologies etc, no SPDs, AFDDs, bi-directional devices etc, etc. 

You may wonder why. It is my belief that there are commercial decisions being made by the accreditation bodies that hold back the changes that would be needed for some qualifications to better reflect the ever changing nature of the electrical installation industry. 

someone will need to have a searching look at the syllabus for many courses. ,,,,,,{things} today are exactly the same as they were when the course was introduced many years ago.

And that's not a new problem either.. Many years ago I had a tutor who was  fairly new to the university where I was studying physics. And he contributed a question to the pool of questions that might be asked in a finals exam. The topic  was very definitely stuff on the syllabus but not in the style of any questions from any previous years.

It was rejected by the exam committee.

because - with some extra accompanying waffle removed for clarity

'Truly original questions are to be discouraged as they cause  unnecessary effort for the examiners; and potentially stress and high failure rates for the students'

So the system favours those who mug up on last year's papers and don't think too hard, because that is more or less what the examiners do as well

Not quite what they said, but certainly what they meant.

FE syllabuses are not alone in having a bad case of  cobwebs and inertia.

Mike.

Perish the thought that examiners might have to work out an answer for themselves! Even in the Fens.

lyledunn said:

You may wonder why. It is my belief that there are commercial decisions being made by the accreditation bodies that hold back the changes that would be needed for some qualifications to better reflect the ever changing nature of the electrical installation industry. 

I suspect it's much simpler than that, it's just a lot of work and investment - and indeed arguing between everyone involved as to what it should be - to change a syllabus (and to be sure it's correct). The exam body itself doesn't have the expertise to do so, their expertise is running exams. This is the sort of thing that the IET (or rather, one of their relevant committees) could influence by making noises at the exam bodies to let them know that they are out of date.

yes well, I was not studying in the fens of course, but in the other place as folk more pompous than I like to call it.

Mike ;-)

mapj1 said:

in the other place

:-)