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Incorporated Engineer (IEng) UK vs Engineering Technologist (ET) Pakistan

Nouman Abid Chuhan
Hi / Assalam u Alaikum


I am registered with the EC as Incorporated Engineer (IEng) through the IET UK.  Now i am very pleased to inform all of you that i am also registered with the National Technology Council (NTC) www.ntc-hec.org.pk Pakistan as Professional Engineering Technologist (PE.Tech).


Four Years B.Tech-Hons or BS Tech or BSc Engineering Technology Degrees (attested by the Higher Education Commission - HEC) are the primary requirement to get register with the NTC Pakistan as the Engineering Technologist.  On the other hand, EC UK requires two years HND or three years Bachelors Engineering or Technology Degree for the title of Incorporated Engineer (IEng).


I would suggest that the EC UK should also upgrade the eligibility criteria for IEng as four years degree and change the title from IEng to Chartered Engineering Technologist (CET).  Its my point of view.  The Standards of other countries may also be compared other than Pakistan in this context.


Thank you.

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    I haven’t checked this line-by-line for accuracy . https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Credit_Accumulation_and_Transfer_Scheme


    Most graduates follow a single structured programme of a specific length. However someone can potentially “mix and match” or stop then start again. Universities have rules about the maximum amount of credit transfer that they will accept as part of one of their degrees. I was once awarded 30M level credits by the Open University for an MSc dissertation done somewhere else, but they wouldn’t exempt me from a module that seemed to duplicate previous achievement.


    Professional Engineering Institutions can only accredit a coherent programme of study, which has been followed by a reasonable number of people, because it is the course they are accrediting (or quality assuring).


    Most of this isn’t particular relevant to IEng, since a non-accredited qualification is always “individual route” under Engineering Council Regulations.

    Applicants who do not have exemplifying qualifications* may demonstrate the required knowledge and understanding in other ways, but must clearly
    demonstrate they have achieved the same level of knowledge and understanding as those with exemplifying qualifications. *“Exemplifying” usually means “Accredited” by an Engineering Council Institution.   


    Nouman,  I can't speak for Engineering Council, but perhaps some UK IEng registered engineers migrating to other countries might benefit from the Sydney Accord. The only UK based IEng that I have ever come across with IntET, gave it up some years ago. I'm afraid that it just never gained much interest in the UK market. After all even our "home grown" IEng has been in long-term decline.        

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    May i know who is the EC Rep at IET please.  Who can listen/respond us (IET Members).
  • 0
    As far as I know, the majority of engineering graduates in the UK are taking three year degrees - they certainly were a few years ago. (If anyone has any actual figure perhaps they could point us to them?) This is because they are cheaper, and seem to offer similar employment prospects. And we also have two year degrees which are likely to grow in popularity https://www.eef.org.uk/campaigning/news-blogs-and-publications/blogs/2018/feb/are-accelerated-degrees-a-thing-what-about-in-engineering

    If IEng or CEng required a four year degree then most UK applicants would simply not apply for registration!


    But anyway, the important point as Roy says is that there is no specific educational requirement for EC registration at any level. What candidates need to do (for IEng and CEng) is to prove that they are able to apply an appropriate level of technical knowledge to their role, and that their role requires a graduate level of technical knowledge. Given that many applicants will apply maybe 10, 15, 20 years after they graduated - when a) they will have forgotten much of what they learned and b) much of it will be out of date anyway - I think this is a very defensible approach.


    Cheers, Andy
  • 0

    Nouman Abid Chuhan:

    May i know who is the EC Rep at IET please.  Who can listen/respond us (IET Members).




    That's actually a very interesting question, which I don't remember being asked before on these various threads. I assume the process would be this:

    1. IET member raises this with a member of Council (details of all council members are available on this site).

    2. The Council member raises it at Council, where it would be referred to - I assume - the Membership and Professional Development Board.

    3. The MPDB would consider whether they want to make a formal proposal, and if so they would produce this and set it before Council.

    4. If Council agree that the proposal should be passed to EC then they would formally pass this on.


    I'm sure those who know the system better than I can comment on whether I've got this right - I'd be (academically) interested to know. Obviously any proposal formally made to EC by the IET has to be very well founded and evidence based. Personally before I made any such proposal to a council member I'd want to know I had the support of a significant number of senior IET volunteers so that I knew I had some chance of being listened to - this is not as unreasonable as it might sound, none of these issues are simple (as Roy sort of says on another thread: if they were simple we'd have solved them already), so showing that any idea you put forward has already been seriously peer reviewed is vitally important.


    I look forward with interest to comments on this!


    Cheers, Andy

  • 0
    By the way, I should have added that any member can of course contact the Registration and Standards team at rssu@theiet.org and they will always do their best to help.


    But of course their role is to implement EC policy according to the IET agreed processes, not to debate potential changes to that policy or process. Changes, or justification of the status quo, are the responsibility of Council and the delegated Boards.


    Thanks, Andy


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    Thank you Andy, Roy, Moshe, Lee and others for participation in this thread.


    is it possible that relevant Board and/or Council Members could also come here on these kind of Threads and respond informally.


    Or i would have to go to "IET Idea" way.


    Thank you.
  • Former Community Member
    0 Former Community Member

    Andy Millar:

    As far as I know, the majority of engineering graduates in the UK are taking three year degrees - they certainly were a few years ago. (If anyone has any actual figure perhaps they could point us to them?) This is because they are cheaper, and seem to offer similar employment prospects. And we also have two year degrees which are likely to grow in popularity




    That's correct Andy. There will always be a safety net for undergraduate students to achieve a choice of award, depending on their highest level of final perfornance: CertHE, DipHE, Fd, BSc/BEng, BSc(Hons)/BEng(Hons), MSc/MEng, and MSc(Hons)/MEng(Hons).


    Universities don't want to throw students out empty handed unnecessarily, as it gives them a bad name and that'll affect future course recruitment.


    What is rather interesting, is what happens to a student who's completed an MEng degree below 1st class; but achieved a 1st class at BEng(Hons)? I think they're only allowed to accept one or the other, but not both.


    Here is the conundrum for the poor graduate; Do I accept my 1st class BEng(Hons) degree (and forfeit my lower class MEng degree) to optimise my chances of a good 1st choice job in my early career; or do I just take my lower class MEng degree in return for a less desirable job, but with a future prospect of CEng registration?

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    Well...they can still get registration at CEng with their BEng so that bit's alright!


    What I don't know is whether the type of HR dept that sorts CVs by degree grade would rate BEng 1 over MEng 2.1.  I'm delighted to say I've never recruited in such an environment...


    Cheers,


    Andy
  • 0
    Nouman,


    I have found that constructive suggestions made in these forums usually come to the attention of those involved in IET governance. More traditional approaches such as writing “letters” to E&T or directly to Nigel Fine may also be considered. As Chief Executive and Secretary Nigel is ultimately responsible for developing and implementing IET strategy and policy, working with and held to account by The Board of Trustees.  


    As a registrant of Engineering Council you can also make representations to them directly. They are currently consulting with all stakeholders. https://www.engc.org.uk/standards-review-consultation/.  It is only necessary to make clear whether you are offering a personal opinion, or speaking as a representative of others (e.g. IEng registered Technologists in Pakistan).


    The IET Registration and Standards Committee (member led and accountable to MPD Board) will develop an IET collective response.  The last time such a consultation was held, I was involved in helping to develop a collective response, as well as making a personal one. I would characterise Engineering Council at the time as being strongly committed to “making the progressive hierarchy clearer” which many older IEng felt as a “downgrade”. We are now five years further on, so the issues and priorities may be different.


    It is possible with some basic research to identify individuals who may be involved, as both IET and EC tend towards transparency, but I don’t think that this helps you. The main reason that I have been able over recent years to contribute an independent view with some level of insider knowledge in these forums, is because I am not responsible therefore and obliged to “tread very carefully”. However, we must also acknowledge that these forums attract only a small cross-section of members opinion, although I try to fairly acknowledge the range of perspectives when I can.  


    IET staff generally who get involved these forums will mainly seek to correct anything which could mislead, or to moderate inappropriate content. Dissent is healthy in my opinion, if expressed respectfully even if it is not always comfortable. We cannot all possibly agree on the range of complex issues that we face, although I hope that we are all willing to be persuaded by evidence.


    I have recently taken more interest in the difficult situation of our sister institution IMechE. Following a period of turmoil the new interim CEO has sought to communicate heavily with their members. You may wish also to be aware of this, if you want to understand better some of the issues and the politics involved in governing the profession. If we set aside the separate structures that exist between us following the failure of the proposed 2006 merger, we should remember that we are very close cousins and that our interests mainly coincide.  I assume that some overseas registrants who are Technologists are affiliated to IMechE and other PEIs.    


    Mehmood,


    I’m sure someone with a recent interest in or involvement with each different university’s regulations applied to MEng and BEng (and by extension BSc, MSc, FDSc, BA, MA etc) could address the issue. I have also highlighted the problem of BEng (Hons) degrees holding IEng rather CEng accreditation, which is an Engineering Council rather than university issue.   

     

    What I think is unfortunate, is that we seem to have created a culture, where such grading is held to be consequential beyond the confines of academia.


    As someone who spent much of my career selecting and training, I am aware that relying on examination grades to select candidates for employment has dubious validity. I understand that if employers are potentially inundated with applications (as are some universities), then grading may help to filter down applications into a manageable number for further evaluation. There is also some correlation between higher grades and “intellectual potential” and/or “contentiousness” . However, I would expect responsible HR professionals to have a good working understanding of Occupational Psychology. I would also expect larger organisations to have carefully validated selection processes based on this. We are dealing here with potential to become an engineer in the organisation, not a proven track record of achievement in a relevant role.


    I noted that some recently developed Degree Apprenticeships (level 6&7) may have adopted unquestioningly the academic selection criteria for the linked degree. This is understandable, but if they select for employment in this way then they may be ignoring much talent, who haven’t engaged so successfully with the “exam factory” school system. I would want to use appropriate psychometric tests to give a more objective view of aptitude. Personality is also absolutely crucial to success in many industries to a far greater extent than anything measured by academic examinations.


    I recently encountered a division of a major technology led business where a culture had developed (through a leader) of recruiting where possible from “Oxbridge or Russell”, this seemed to meet the business needs well (with a cost implication) and I would characterise the internal culture as hardworking, results based and entirely unpretentious.  I also know a different technically world-leading division, where the leaders having come via apprenticeships themselves, seem in academic terms less “selective”, but their younger engineers drawn from a mix of BEng/MEng graduates from universities new and old including some part-time student ex-apprentices, demonstrated the same values and performance levels.


  • 0
    Roy Bowdler:

    As someone who spent much of my career selecting and training, I am aware that relying on examination grades to select candidates for employment has dubious validity. I understand that if employers are potentially inundated with applications (as are some universities), then grading may help to filter down applications into a manageable number for further evaluation. There is also some correlation between higher grades and “intellectual potential” and/or “contentiousness” . However, I would expect responsible HR professionals to have a good working understanding of Occupational Psychology. I would also expect larger organisations to have carefully validated selection processes based on this. We are dealing here with potential to become an engineer in the organisation, not a proven track record of achievement in a relevant role.


    Hmmm...personally my experience has been that all too often grade requirements are not based on a validated process, rather from a mixture of gut instinct that higher grades must be best and a simple need to draw a line somewhere to develop a "long list" of applicants. I have had numerous "frank and free discussions" with various HR departments over the years who have wanted to introduce degree grade requirements into jobs for my team, without them actually understanding what the roles were. Practically, unless your company is the size of Google or Network Rail (to pick two random examples) I guess it's going to be hugely difficult to measure correlation between graduate grades and subsequent performance with any form of reliability and validity. 


    This is not to say that there isn't a correlation, just that I've never seen it demonstrated, not has anyone passed me details of studies that show such a correlation exists - I would be really interested to know of any. I will admit that I do have a personal gut (or experience) idea (rightly or wrongly!) of how the correlation between degree grades and subsequent performance as an engineer works - but then according to my own feel I shouldn't be doing the job I'm doing! Which at best goes to show that in any correlation there will always be outliers, which is why I really don't like blanket rules of "only people with xyz qualification can possibly be capable of engineering abc". So yes, I 100% agree with your first sentence Roy!!!


    If the IET had the funds to do it (maybe they do?) this would be a really useful area for them to fund a study into - how does qualification level at "graduation" (including apprentice routes) correspond to success as an engineer by role 5/10/15 years later. The challenge is - who would you survey? I don't have figures to hand for the retention rate of engineering graduates in the UK by their first employer, but I'm guessing (and I'll admit it is a guess) only about 20% stay there for five years? If this is anywhere near right, then employers wouldn't actually know how successful long term their recruitment strategy is in selecting good engineers - so I guess it would have to be a survey of engineers themselves?


    Of course this is much easier to determine in my part of the world, where graduates tend to stay with their first employer until retirement, redundancy or grim reaper, whichever comes first smiley Which focusses the mind when recruiting people. And explains why I used to worry far less about specific grades than whether I would be able to cope with working with this person for the next 25 years or more... 


    Cheers,


    Andy

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