AdamB Posted February 1, 2013 Share Posted February 1, 2013 I recieved this email earlier from my university about protecting the title and status of "Engineer"It would be appreciated if you could spare 30 seconds to sign, I'm sure I'm not the only person who gets annoyed being branded someone I'm not. Dear Sir,I am an engineering masters degree student at Swansea University. During my time at Swansea my fellow engineering students and I have decided that something needs to be done about what society thinks an engineer is and does. A careers’ talk was given last week to the secondary school children by a postgraduate student engineer, he asked a room of children what they thought an ‘engineer’ was. Their unanimous response was one of agreement that an engineer is someone who “fixes things”. Another issue that arose was a simple job advertisement in the local paper, it read “Hair Engineer required”. The term ‘engineer’ is being misused and quite frankly abused. The mind boggles when one sees society treat a hair-dresser and the likes of Ismbard Kingdom Brunel with the same amount of respect. We came to realise that something needs to change. This is a point of contention that has regularly appeared in various engineering publications. However, no serious attempt has been made to change the perception that society has, granted, it is not a simple quick-fix situation. It was soon decided that a petition would be made to legally protect the title of ‘Engineer’ in Britain as it is in many other countries worldwide, USA, Canada, Germany and France to name a few. An e-petition has been created at http://epetitions.direct.gov.uk/. There is a small team currently working on this campaign, the petition was finally accepted today (30 January 2013) and will remain online until 12 months from today. The aim is to gain a sufficient number of signatures to prompt the government and more importantly the cabinet to consider a change in law to legally protect the title. This will prevent the non-professionals from using the term engineer and over time this will change the opinions that society will have for us engineers. The aim of this is to hopefully change the opinions of those young children, to encourage them to pursue a career in engineering. The subject is well known for being a difficult one to study; the students need more of an incentive to study such a subject. Protecting this title will also (eventually) increase the salaries of engineers nationwide and bring them up to a level on par with other countries. In the United States of America an engineer is treated far differently than they are here in Britain. Stateside, when the term engineer is used it is instantly associated with respect and admiration. So what has gone wrong in Britain? Britain used to be the great power in terms of engineering, the likes of Brunel, Sir Frank Whittle, Sir Barnes Wallis and Sir Henry Royce, these no longer exist. We do however have many engineers that can be mentioned in the same sentence as those previously mentioned, such as Sir James Dyson and Adrian Newey, however they rarely are. The likes of Dyson and Newey are great role models for the next generation, let us support this; let us make Britain Great again. After reading this, I’m sure you might be thinking “What does this have to do with me?”, well we need to spread the word for this petition. We need you to email this to every engineering and science student you have studying under your faculty. There are more than 300 universities in Britain; most teach a form of engineering or science. A target of 100,000 signatures is required before it is discussed among our politicians at Westminster. If each university has 1000 students studying these subjects then a sufficient number of signatures will be achieved. The aim is to gain support from the large organisations and companies nationwide, before this can be done, a vast number of signatures are required in order to prove that the cause is worthwhile. The direct link to the e-petition is as follows:http://epetitions.direct.gov.uk/petitions/44889 We would greatly appreciate your support on the matter, please send this out to all students and staff alike. Thank you. Kind Regards Bradley Cox and the team Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Vincent-ep91 Posted February 1, 2013 Share Posted February 1, 2013 its the same story with dietitian and nutritionist, people interchange the two titles. They are two very different things and one has far greater standing than the other. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
yaristurbo Posted February 1, 2013 Share Posted February 1, 2013 What is a correct description of a engineer? Quote Link to post Share on other sites
yaristurbo Posted February 1, 2013 Share Posted February 1, 2013 *grabs ear and makes "brumm-brumm" noise*What's that?An engineer. (engine-ear, see. Aha.)*grabs ear and says "brumm-brumm, hello, brumm-brumm"*What's that?A civil engineer. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
AdamB Posted February 1, 2013 Author Share Posted February 1, 2013 What is a correct description of a engineer? I believe an engineer is someone who uses their initiative to design something, invent something. Everyone has their own take on who or what an engineer does, but I agree with the petition that the title of an engineer should be closed to certain professionals. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Whitenoize Posted February 1, 2013 Share Posted February 1, 2013 Would be very hard to close the term engineer to a certain profession i do agree that the term engineer is used alot for cretin professions that are total bollics but an engineer doesn't just design or invent things as such I'm in the royal engineers and I've never invented or designed anything in my life and I don't have any fancy uni qualifications but still do alot of tasks that involve engineering work and would class myself as a combat engineer id say problem solving is a big part of engineer work like some of the tasks we have been given in work would amaze sum people and not just any engineer could do them IMO Quote Link to post Share on other sites
K24_glanza Posted February 1, 2013 Share Posted February 1, 2013 I do agree but people with fancy degree's in engineering that would probably struggle to wire a plug annoy me more. Like some of the bosses I have had who are chartered engineers with absolutely no common sense. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
daniel_g Posted February 1, 2013 Share Posted February 1, 2013 Totally agree with that ^ No point knowing the theory if you dont have the capability to put it into practice. The dude who wrote that email says hes a student engineer, so technically he isn't even a engineer, well not yet anyway lol. Do surgeons get pissed off when gardeners call themselves ' tree surgeons ' haha ? So lets say an engineer is a designer or inventor, what about the guys physically building the bridge, for example, what are they then ? See i'd class them as the engineers. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
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