Action | Develop regulations for a mandatory continuing education requirement for architect, professional engineer, and land surveyor licenses. |
Stage | Proposed |
Comment Period | Ended on 5/2/2008 |
Like many other engineers in my field, I chose to pursue licensure as a way of advancing my career in lieu of embarking on an advanced degree educational path. I most certainly would have pursued another degree had I known that the state would immediately attempt to strip my license from me by imposing excessive maintenance requirements. I don't need continuing education to keep me current on mechanical design techniques. This is because in the course of accomplishing prudent design efforts, I look for the most current method. As it turns out, for most mechanical design, little has changed in 30 or more years! Continuing education is absurd for such disciplines. Like most of my colleagues, I and perfectly capable of staying current without the extra burden of continuing education.
The current licensure program have identified those engineers that are highly skilled, capable, goal-oriented, and professional, and this requirement is likely to strip many of those valualbe contributors of their title. Those that have gone through the torturous rite of passage of the FE exam and the PE exam, have already proven themselves. They don't need to do the same thing every year by expending the money and leave time earned at the very jobs for which they got the license!!
Furthermore, if it is decided that this nearly valueless requirement will be imposed on our highly skilled and often overworked engineers, the requirement should be phased in such that current engineers are protected by grandfathering. The requirement should only affect new licensees.