More on the AQF

I suggest that in the main qualifications awarded under the Australian Qualification Framework (AQF) do not quite live up to the objectives. So what follows includes how the AQF is working, and proposals to improve some aspects.

The objectives of the AQF, are to allow employers to identify people competent for the task at hand and improve occupational mobility. The educated should not be trapped in some silly occupational class or locked out by some elitist professional cult.

The AQF qualifications are supposed to improve mobility, movement up through the levels is meant to result in increased depth of knowledge, increase in independent thought and increase in personal responsibility.

Content vs Duration

The qualifications are meant to be defined by content not by duration, unfortunately the university sector doesn't comply they base awards on duration. So a 4 year B.Eng rather than being defined by required content is defined mostly by the duration.

That is graduates having spent 4 years to get a degree, believe they are superior than other graduates, who only spent 3 years to get a B.Sc or B.A. The other degrees however are not occupational degrees they are traditional academic degrees and typically involve far greater intellectual rigour than an occupational degree like a B.Eng. {The 4 year duration, seems to be mostly because of breadth of subject matter, slowness of the students, and and time spent on industry experience. In other words it lacks academic content, rather than such graduates being paid more on graduation they should be paid less. (we have industrial awards which set pay and conditions, and the award says they should be paid more)}

Anyway as a consequence of other occupations and industries not paying too much attention to content and more interest in status of higher awards, some minimum durations were imposed. Minimum durations do not entirely help, as an isolated topic can be presented rapidly in 1 hour, or it can be dragged out over several hours. Though expect that there is an optimum time in which learning can actually take place.

Therefore expect with the passage of time, the content of programmes will increase as the time required to present a subject decreases. However also expect that in lower level programmes the time taken will increase and the content will decrease, as more effort is expended to develop higher level of  proficiency and make them more conversant.

Education vs Training

However developing proficiency is why in previous posts I have suggested that we split education from training. We restrict education to foundational knowledge and enabling competences, and is more evaluation than learning. Whilst training academies focus on increased proficiency: lots of repetition until achieve the required level of performance.

With a split between education and training, most of the trade oriented qualifications will comprise of two parts: the AQF award and an associated Certificate of Practice (CoP). Prior AQF's will be identified as containing the CoP, modern awards will indicate explicit exclusion of the CoP. So people can get the foundational knowledge and then become adequately qualified to gain experience. If they cannot gain the AQF award then they are not adequately qualified to gain experience. The training academies become an important filter between education and industry.

Once someone has a CoP, at some future date they may have to complete supplementary training and assessment to verify that they still meet the minimum requirements. Whilst initial training maybe anything from 2 weeks to 250 weeks, corroboration of ability may only take 1 day.

Mobility

Improved mobility is achieved by recognising common foundational knowledge and skill sets across various occupations, and creating appropriate educational awards and study programmes. Obviously this may result in programmes which contain content not relevant to a given occupation. However if an occupation or profession is defined by breadth, then it can be defined in terms of multiple AQF awards rather than one. We should not be defining bachelor degree programmes because of required breadth.

If need a ticket to belong to a profession or occupation, then that can be separate to the AQF awards and CoP's. A national organisation can issue a card the size of a credit card which lists occupations for which are qualified, on the front and AQF awards and CoP's on the back., along with a separate document providing a detailed summary. Basically little different than becoming a graded member of some qualifying body: the membership grade is the qualification not the educational awards. However for the proposal the qualifying body would ultimately be an international organisation, with national branches.

There should be no issue having multiple low level AQF's to define an occupation, if an occupation is required.

Knowledge Content and Academic Rigour

There seems to have been a split in the AQF at level 6 where have the advance diploma and the associate degree. Where the associate degree is seen as more academically rigorous than the advanced diploma. This also indicates the split between the university education sector and the vocational education sector.

This is where things have got messed up, along with the senior secondary certificate of education (SSCE) which doesn't properly fit into the AQF. The problem is that after grade 10, students can study towards AQF awards, or pursue grade 11 and grade 12 to get the SSCE. Some AQF programmes require the SSCE for entry, whilst others don't.

So for example to enter into a bachelor degree programme (AQF-7/AQF-8) would require to complete the SSCE. But can otherwise get advanced diploma or associate degree (AQF-6) and gain status for upto 2 years in the degree programme. Some people got the advanced diploma without SSCE, either because in the past it was possible to start without such qualification, or because of adult entry.

Clearly there is inequity, in that the original 5 year programme to get a 3 year degree has been collapsed to 3 years (Original: 2 years for SSCE + 3 year degree).

Therefore my proposal is that we scrap the SSCE, and after grade 10, start on AQF awards. No repetition in grade 11, grade 12 and first year at university. All is properly coordinated, and all education requires stepping up through the AQF, no jumping levels.

If cannot jump levels, then only one way to get a AQF-7 qualification and that is to successfully pass through the 6 previous levels. To get a bachelor degree you have to get an advanced diploma, no buts doubts or maybe's about it. This means those persons at a higher level in a more supervisory role, are aware of the capabilities of those educated at a lower level.

In other words we don't waste education because a whole heap of school leavers have got a B.Eng gone into an organisation and got the idea that those with an advanced diploma are only capable of drafting because that is where such persons have been stuck. Both those with AQF-6 and AQF-8 levels of education need opportunity to put their education to work and gain experience to develop competence and confidence.

Furthermore if you have progressed up the ladder rather than having jumped in at the top, and started work at the lower level you will be aware of the education required to complete a given task. Thus appropriate people can be trained and put to work. No false claims of shortages.

I'm not against providing visa's and allowing foreigners to do the work. I am however against the foreigners being exploited to do the work, and then being unceremoniously tossed out off the country when no longer needed. I am also against high level people being brought in to do something which is trite from their viewpoint. We should get the right people to do the work, and if we can educate and train them locally then we should do so. But training becomes impractical if all the time we declare there is a shortage of people with bachelor programmes and 5 to 10 years experience. It suggests we have a loss of leadership, and therefore not capable of assessing if  people are adequately qualified.

If we can say that designing a structure only requires a 2 year Associate Degree and educated people at that level and provide them opportunity, we save significant resources, and reach our objectives faster.

Take engineering each discipline can be broken into about 5 major areas of practice, according to NCEES in the USA.

Civil Engineering:

1. Construction
2. Geotechnical
3. Structural
4. Transportation
5. Water Resources and Environmental

Mechanical Engineering

1. Basic Engineering Practice
2. Mechanical Systems and Materials
3. Hydraulics and Fluids
4. Energy/Power systems
5. HVAC/Refrigeration

Industrial Engineering (management)

1. Facilities Engineering and Planning
2. Systems Analysis and Design
3. Logistics
4. Work Design
5. Ergonomics and Safety
6. Quality Engineering

Architectural Engineering

1. Building Systems Integration
2. Electrical Systems
3. Mechanical Systems
4. Structural Systems
5. Project Management and Construction Administration

Note that in all these lists they are referring to technology not to the technical science.  So my formal education covers mechanical, industrial and manufacturing engineering, I also took options in structures and agricultural engineering.

Structures and mechanical systems are dependent on engineering mechanics both statics and dynamics, along with the mechanics of the strength and stability of materials. Therefore civil engineering and mechanical engineering overlap, except that most civil's wouldn't cover dynamics.

Water resources is dependent on hydraulics which is specialisation of fluid mechanics, the last 4 items in the mechanical engineering list are dependent on thermofluid dynamics.

The architectural engineering branch covers the structural and mechanical technologies as they relate to buildings. There is no coverage of the design of fabrication and construction processes, or logistics of supplying materials to the construction site. That project management stuff will be more about money, schedules and contract law.

Also note that there are 6 areas in industrial engineering, not just 5. Also elsewhere it maybe described as industrial management rather than engineering.

So as before, if take the first year of a 4 year programme as covering the common science, then that typically leaves 3 years to cover 5 areas of practice. So a 2 year AQF-6 programme can easily maintain the academic rigour of a 4 year B.Eng and cover a single area of practice which only gets 1 and 3/5ths of a year. So in a 2 year programme there is 2/5ths of a year available for increased focus on the area of practice.

For example an Associate Degree in Structures: could cover the basic engineering mechanics, statics and dynamics, structural mechanics (analysis), and the mechanics of the strength and stability of materials as well as cover more technology specific requirements such as building structures and bridge structures.

A 2 year programme would stick to frames. Whilst a 3 year programme would extend into plates, shells, cable-nets and tension membranes, vibration and fatigue of structures.

Now I missed the soils and geotechnical aspects of the technology. Very important as the structures, no matter whether buildings, bridges, machines or other non-machine structure, all stand on the ground. However geotechnical is increasingly becoming a specialisation. If it is critical and important then want a specialist, if not critical then it's not that complex. The basics of footing design can thus be covered in the 2 year qualification for structures.

Now if geotechnical depends on knowledge of structures, then it adds the 3rd year after studying AQF-6 in structures, as an alternative to studying alternative structural forms. I doubt however it is so dependent, it depends on mechanics and that should be covered in the first year.

The first year would become an AQF-5 in technical science and mathematics. It should cover the content of the American FE breadth exam. Whilst the AQF-6 programme covers requirements for FE depth, and PE depth exam but lacks PE breadth.

We shouldn't need the likes of the American FE/PE exam if the academic institutions examinations are rigorous enough, and the requirements for getting the AQF award are robust enough.

Similarly we should not need registration or licensing requirements if people are properly educated and trained.

So the problem with the sign post falling over and the cracks in the Opal towers is because people adequately qualified in structures did not design the structures and people with still greater capability in structures did not properly review and approve the evidence-of-suitability. Licensing people based on current academic records and professional memberships will not resolve the issues. We need people more competent in structural design, we need better managed projects, we need better controlled projects.

... to be continued ...

Loss of Status

All existing bachelor degrees will loose status. This is not a problem as all academic awards should loose status with the passage of time.

That which can be studied in the first 10 years of education can be increased with the passage of time. As more books are written and published, more information becomes accessible. Furthermore books improve the presentation of subject matter with time. On the other hand subjects can also  become increasingly complex with the passage of time. One subject also builds upon another subject, so that have subjects, involving studying the studying of the subject, or studying the people studying the subject, or the history of the subject. Some times these are important complements other times they are irrelevant and unimportant.

Furthermore books can give way to video, and animations and  interactive programmes, so that learning is made easier and assessment is made more robust. So that hopefully the certificate I from last year is not as good as the certificate I from this year. And hopefully it is never the other way around, with last years qualifications being superior.

Also last year needed someone special to find a solution to a problem, this year and there after, people with lesser knowledge can be educated to apply the solution. So at one point we needed to know how to design beams, and how to design walls of circular tanks: now that as a society we hold such knowledge, now we, just need to train people to use such knowledge.

If there is a defined body of knowledge used to define a profession then that body of knowledge can be published and should be published. As a designer I like to know what a carpenter should be capable of doing, and also what they are willing to do or have the resources to do. Armed with such knowledge I can minimise my documentation. Alternatively I can expand documentation and save them time. But if I expect the carpenter to have more knowledge than they have, and the carpenter believes they know more than they actually do, then we have a problem.

Clearly has human knowledge increases we expect to have more specialists. So now we have hundreds if not thousands of people who now have a bachelor degree defining their job, and giving rise to more and more professional cults. Yet the need for these degrees in the main has little to do with the needs of the work, and more to do with poorly defined and poorly designed jobs.

Now clearly if each area of practice is only given 1 and 3/5th of a year in a 4 year programme (AQF-8), but an AQF-6 programme, well gives it 2 years and provides more content, then the AQF-6 programme makes that individual more competent and capable in the given area of practice. Furthermore the next generation will require 5 x AQF-6 programmes to get the same breadth. Assuming that all are based on a common foundation at AQF-5, then that is a total of 1 + 5=6 years of study versus the 4 year programme.

In terms of breadth the 3 and 4 year programmes should fall out of favour. But new 3 year programmes should emerge which properly cover depth and appropriate specialisations.

Societies Confidence

As I say no need for registration and licensing, proper education and training and recognition of such through the AQF should take care of such.

Confidence in Design

Defects in design are largely a consequence of pressure due to budget and time constraints: if don't sell time and don't believe all units of time have the same value, then not quite the same problem. On top of these constraints is owners/developers introducing last minute changes whether at the end of design or part way through construction.

Now this becomes a problem, when have inadequate checks and balances in place. The issue is not about who checks work, but how work is checked.

Design is a creative activity, it imagines potential solutions to a set of objectives and constraints, and the proposals are guided by qualitative appreciation of science. Where feasible some numbers are crunched to give some quantitative guidance. Designers work at drawing boards, they alternate between drawing and calculations. Drawings are used to resolve dimensional and geometric issues of fit, to get a clear picture of relationships. Whilst dimensions may well be calculated, sketches are used to define relationships, the geometry and shape of things. Scale drawings can validate or refute assumptions. For example, the arithmetic doesn't add up because missed dimension of a clearance, or a gasket or something not usually present.

Calculations and drawings therefore reinforce one another, one is a second opinion on the other: a check and a balance. You should have at least two ways of doing things, if the two ways give different answers and they should give the same, then need to find an explanation and then fix the approach which is giving the wrong answer or find other approaches better suited to the task.

The process of design should therefore be close to self correcting. However often have multiple conflicting requirements. So when finished and have documented the whole, then review the finished document and assess if it is fit-for-function and met all objectives: or otherwise explicitly identify the conflicting objectives and the compromises made.

Design-calculations are seldom suitable as Proof-Calculations. Once design is completed then need to do proof-calculations. For example wouldn't use AS4100 steel structures code to design a steel beam, it is too complex and convoluted. Rather design is carried out using simpler calculations, for example "find and get in the ballpark" using full section properties and a suitable design-factor. Then check compliance with AS4100 using the more cumbersome to calculate effective section properties. Of course we can simplify the process and produce design capacity tables (DCT's), and thus the process becomes more efficient as we can get a suitable section more directly with fewer calculations. We can speed things even further with span tables for specific applications. Faster still is to use computers. It is still however a "trial and error" exercise as the analysis calculations are dependent on knowing the properties of a suitable section, and the point of the calculations is to find a suitable section. So we guess and check, and use each previous guess to direct our next guess, until we converge upon the structural solution. Most other areas of practice are similar. There are few situations where it is practical  to rearrange the mathematical expressions and directly calculate the value we are seeking.

Irrespective we have this process of design-calculation which then results in a specification-of-intent
which we then need to check is a valid design-solution to our defined design-problem. So our final calculations provide proof of compliance with a code of practice and all other objectives and requirements. These proof-calculations form the first stage of the evidence-of-suitability for the proposal.

If the design is simple and non-critical then the designer can do their own proof checks a few hours or a few days later. If the system is not simple and is critical then another person should carry out an independent review. An independent review is not an arithmetic check, it is not a school teacher checking the work. An independent review is carried out using the specification-of-intent, and only such specification, the reviewer has no need to see the designers calculations. {My experience is large Australian consultancies do not carry out proper independent reviews they get graduates to basically do arithmetic checks. Who may or may not otherwise ask what is this all about? It is good if they do ask, as they can start learning how to do such calculations, and demonstrate that they have understanding of the concepts. It is however not a proper independent check, it can be used as a secondary check and learning exercise but not a substitute for formal review.}

Once the designer organisation is happy they have validated the design. The specification-of-intent can be released for regulatory review. Regulatory review is only concerned with compliance with regulations: if not in the regulations then of no consequence. It is therefore the designer's responsibility to highlight additional requirements which may go above and beyond the minima of the codes and to have had these properly checked and validated because the regulator isn't going to check or validate them.

Now once again the regulator should be capable of carrying out an independent review without reference to the designers-proof calculations. However:

An independent review can only be properly executed if there has been a deliberate intent to make a proposal suitable for purpose and a defendable assertion to that effect has been made. [sch]

The designer doesn't need to submit their proof calculations, but they need make declaration that they are capable of defending their claim that a proposal is fit-for-function. Traditionally that is as simple as several people working for the consultant signing off on the drawings. Typically would include the designer, chief-designer, and senior representative of the organisation. For small projects and small consultancies, it would just be the signature of the designer. {Unfortunately seems people are more concerned about intellectual property rights, and copyright than getting things right. So building designers drawings have business name on them and copyright notice, but seldom a signature or initials indicating that they are the designer responsible. The drawings bounce back and forth between council and themselves until it becomes compliant. Not really acceptable as the certifier is more designer, than independent reviewer.}

If there is no indication of who is advocate or proponent for the proposal, then the regulator shouldn't be wasting their time reviewing the proposal, as their independence from the design process will be compromised. The regulator would become more a design manager guiding the design process until it converges on a compliant design. Not their role.

So the regulator gets the appropriate documents (which do not include the proof-calculations), and can now independently review the project. The issue is that the regulator doesn't have enough time to carry out a proper independent review, and fees are inadequate for such purpose.

Possibly true. But it is also true that the regulators do not appear to put any time into developing suitable design tools to aid their specific role.

For example nailed plated roof trusses were a problem, because rapidly designed by software, and the output lacked detail. So lacks detail, but did the specification of intent lack detail? If can write software to rapidly design the trusses can equally well write software to check compliance: where was the compliance checking software, where is the compliance checking software? Doesn't exist because typically use general purpose structural analysis software, but such software is too slow. Therefore need more specific software optimised for the task at hand: it needed to be developed, it still needs to be developed. But that is just the assessment, by calculation.

There is still the issue of the specification-of-intent: was that adequate? The answer is no. A proper specification would have clear details regarding the connections. It would make it clear that nail plates fit and have adequate anchorage in each member. The information would be in the specification to allow checking that the nail plates have adequate resistance. If connections are not drawn to scale, then a lot of information is missing. It isn't always necessary to draw the connections, as some connections are simple and the fit is obvious. For example 2M20's into a 250 PFC likely acceptable, the same bolts in a C7510 is likely a problem unless the bolts are maybe side by side (but would still like to know about end distances and edge distance.).

If drawings lack the information to conduct an independent review, then the drawings are not good enough. The drawings may not give the information directly, but expect to find the information necessary to derive other information. Though if have to draw additional sections, may consider the drawings inadequate.

The review process is iterative. The detail of the review calculations depends on the specification. If the design is robust then a quick and simple calculation may justify its suitability. If the design is optimum, and pushing everything to the minimum, then more calculation effort would be required, and therefore more time needed.

Whilst the review process is iterative like the design process it requires fewer iterations than design. Design has to find a valid solution, review only needs to accept or reject a proposal. Review can stop as soon as it hits a point of rejection. However, review should be as refined as necessary before claiming rejection. That is to say there are no further refinements which could be made which by any stretch of the imagination would result in compliance.

In the first instance the reviewer should check all qualitative and attribute requirements before making any quantitative assessment. When they reject they should then identify all non-compliance checks upto the point of first calculation: making it clear that review has stopped. If the qualitative issues will affect calculations, then no point in starting calculation checks.

Thus the defects in buildings are not so much a consequence of poorly educated personnel, but personnel operating in defective systems. Furthermore ISO:9000 accredited organisations are highly likely to have defective quality systems, as typically all they have done is rename contract document management systems to QA systems.

They may monitor drafting errors, but they have few systems in place to monitor design errors, or this thing they like to call engineering. Whilst these days they may have software to do a lot of the calculations, something needs to check and balance the suitability of the software for the task. For example AS4100 does not cover torsion, therefore if a 3D frame has torsion, then would not expect that any 3D design software checking to AS4100 would make valid checks. So have two choices, follow tradition and avoid torsion, so go remove the torsion by changing the connections. Or check the suitability of the members for torsion. {Whilst this is outside the scope of AS4100 to provide a check, it is within the scope of the NCC/BCA that assessing suitability for such action is required, though no method of checking is provided. So code compliance doesn't mean fit-for-function, and NCC/BCA deemed-to-satisfy provisions do not satisfy. So I reiterate if something is merely code compliant it is low quality rubbish.}

So engineering consultancies need to improve their quality systems, understand quality robust design, and better monitor and control design errors. It is not about who to blame, it is about designing the correct process for design. It is about appropriate organisational structure and decision processes. It is about appropriate training and development of personnel. Not everything can be billable.

Writing career episode and work practice reports is not graduate development, and it is not training. Fast tracking graduates to CP.Eng is not in the best interests of society nor the interests of the graduate. They need to know how deficient their knowledge and abilities are, not elevated on a pedestal.

Confidence in design doesn't come from who did the design, but how the design was completed and how it was reviewed and checked.

I have no confidence in design approval  in Queensland and Victoria as it seems built around a self certifying authoritarian cult who fill in silly forms (Form 13 as I remember is used in one of the states). There seems no checks and balances on when they can self certify. And with self certifying there is no feedback to inform the "engineer" just how deficient their knowledge is and how defective their understanding.

For years I thought the SA system was defective because the people on the regulatory side have highly inconsistent competency. So builders move from working in one council area to another, as do the architects and engineers, and they complain about lack of consistency in application of the rules. "I didn't have to do that before", is a common phrase. From which get the impression they will go back to ignoring an issue on their next project in another council area.

Sometimes the council requests seem unreasonable and silly, and have to churn out a stack of pages to declare an issue to be: negligible, zero, insignificant. Pages which wouldn't be required if the regulator had appropriate experience, and knew the issue was of no significance. Various regulations now require that the people issuing certificates of an independent technical expert (CITE), have CP.Eng credentials. Unfortunately the people are mostly the same people as previous, and therefore the inconsistency remains. However, some are good and some are bad, and a designer learns from the good ones, a good designer learns from both. With good ones, it is possible to discuss issues with. The bad ones are authoritarian obstacles to be removed: they blindly apply codes where they are irrelevant, and seem to have little interest in learning and understanding the specifics of a project which make the code more hazard than benefit.

Still, good or bad, two people are more likely to find defects than one person. Also most of the criticism I put in my calculation reports seems to find its way into changes in the code. So by influencing one group of people I indirectly contribute to removing ambiguities and deficiencies in the codes. Not necessary to be out there with my name up in lights.

... continued ...

Confidence doesn't come from knowing that an electrician is licensed and they pay their license fees every year. Confidence comes from knowing that they were properly educated, trained and assessed as competent in the first place. Then knowing that they know their own limitations, and will put the work aside when their capabilities deteriorate with age. If not then expect that there are systems in place and feedback mechanisms which prevent them from doing serious harm.

If an electrician, plumber or builder does their work without it being checked or audited then it is not acceptable. But may consider that is an hassle, given had may have had problems finding an available tradesperson in the first place. However the checks and balances do not have to be direct inspection.

If an electrician does some work on a house then the as-built drawings need to be revised, which means the as-built drawings need to exist. The as-built drawings then get submitted to the regulating authority. If there are issues with the drawings the site can be inspected immediately, if no issues with the drawings the site can be inspected at a much later date. If there are issues at a later date then all the sites can be inspected: which therefore requires knowing all the sites.

Better however is the presence of an independent inspector just prior to the work being closed up and hidden from view.  No payment needs to be made for the work until both the electrician and inspector sign-off on the work. This is not an exercise in collecting signatures and identifying where to lay blame.  It is simply a check on the quality of the work. So a system independent of names and scrap paper can be implemented if possible. For example both electrician and inspector have tagging tools, each receives appropriate tags from the regulator, and each tags the work. The electrician cannot tag the work as inspected because they don't have the right tags and tagging tool. Though something more robust than that is preferable.

The requirement is that the work needs to be demonstrated as correct and that no hazards have been created. So a certain set of tests can be mandated which have to be witnessed by the building owner.

So education, training, and quality assurance system. No registration, no licensing, no system to administer and no licensing fees.  Just need operational systems which have built-in checks and balances. Systems which catch mistakes when the electrician or other trade is having a bad day.

..o0o..

 I got side tracked. I had more to write about the certificate programs. The stepping through the programs, and need for breadth. But cannot remember what it was.

Something along lines of minimum duration of 1 year programme 1500 hours. All programmes start with certificates. But first year is broken into 5 substages. For academic programme, that is minimum of 300 hours for each substage. A maximum of 5 strands to cover breadth. So 60 hours for each strand. A year divided into 50 productive weeks, so 10 weeks for each fifth. Resulting in 6 hours each week for each strand. Possible strands are:

1. Technology
2. Technical Drawing / Descriptive Geometry
3. Mathematics
4. Physics
5. Chemistry & Materials

This leaves out such subjects as:

1. Management
2. Biology
3. Geology
4. Psychology

If these are important subjects, then it maybe seen that the breadth is not great enough. Alternative may consider broader subjects, from my earlier breakdown of subjects:

1. Design
2. Technical Drawing & Engineering Graphics
3. Process Technology: Manufacturing & Construction           
4. Product Technology: Building Construction
5. Management, Business and Office Procedures
6. Legal Framework

This suggests expanding to 6 strands, though legal framework could be combined with the management strand. Also this doesn't directly address mathematics and science, as this is buried in the design and technology subject areas. Or define other broad areas:

1. Technology
2. Design
3. Science
4. Mathematics

With this approach introduce the technology, then move onto design of the technology, give rise to need for science which in turn gives rise to mathematics. All four strands are increased in depth during the first year, then in second year only science and mathematics are increased.

If more breadth is required then first year may have to comprise of multiple certificate 1 programmes, and therefore will not complete Certificate V in the first year, and will not move onto an associate degree in the second year.

However with proposed system we are now starting the programme at grade 11 not after grade 12. So we have an extra 2 years to the typical 3 year bachelor programme, in which appropriate depth and breadth are developed. Hence my earlier proposal for Diploma I to Diploma V, and Masters I to Masters V. Where grade 11 = Certificate V and grade 12 is Diploma I, and 3 year bachelor degree is Diploma IV, and graduate diploma = Diploma V. Which also means that grade 12 = Associate Degree and thus no longer provides any status in a bachelor programme: as all bachelor programmes have to be completely redesigned to increase depth on the associate degrees.

The importance of the redesign is that people will be ready to enter the workplace earlier and they are qualified to be employed on meaningful work. So they can work whilst they study for higher level qualifications. This is important because many are studying because there is need to get a ticket to employment, low skilled jobs are rapidly taken, therefore difficult to get a job to pay for studies. Not everyone can get a job stocking shelves in a supermarket or working behind a bar: they need qualifications to get a job. So the qualifications need to be quicker to get, but more robust assessment of capability is required.

The staged progress from AQF-1 upwards is the more productive, efficient and higher quality approach than jumping to AQF-7 straight from school. We filter people out at AQF-1, and onwards. So AQF-1 has the harshest and most demanding assessment requirements. For example at AQF-1 expect some 50% are rejected and cannot progress further, by AQF-5 expect only 5% are rejected: by such point people should be on the right path. After AQF-5, still expect that programmes are split into 1/5th blocks or 10 week blocks, and that progressive assessments are made so that a person can quit before going to far. For example they can halt progress to AQF-6 and take another path starting with any other lower AQF level that they have passed. They may decide that AQF-5 is their limit and just choose to increase breadth at that level.

A clever workforce is not one with great depth of knowledge, but rather an adaptive workforce with broad multi-skilling. A builder who has skills in electrical and plumbing work is preferable than need for a group. At an abstract level plumbing and electrical systems are similar: both involve networks with some driving force. For that matter could design and build a fluid power computing device. Which raises the issue that plumbers don't go near fluid power systems whether hydraulic (typically oil) or pneumatic. A plumber is thus not a mechanical engineering technician.

So if could get plumbers and electricians to become multiskilled and move to the next level, that is potentially far better workforce than pushing people through bachelor degrees. As much can be designed and built at the technician level. And more is possible at that level if knowledge was being properly pushed down to where it can empower and enable people to do what they need.

Licensing doesn't enable and empower people to get things done, it hinders them. If I design something which is electrical do I need an electrician to make it, especially if it works of a battery? I can see the need for an electrician if needs to be plugged into the mains. However, they are not electrical technicians, so they wouldn't be entirely capable of  assessing the technology. So we get to the point where the license is the hazard not the safeguard: and we otherwise have no safeguard in place.

What I am doing designing electrical? Why wouldn't I, it's the main power source for factory automation besides fluid power. I know I don't know enough to fully verify fitness-for-function, but I can still design, propose and get full fitness-for-function verified by someone else. Design of a fluid power control system doesn't immediately consider the fluid mechanics, as need to specify a control system before start sizing pipes and pumps. I could probably verify the pipes and pumps if had an appropriate industry manual. Not so much a matter of science, but a matter of design data and standard practice.

Consistent and good practice is dependent on appropriate industry manuals and design data and such references based on local practice are in short supply or just plain none existent. It tends to reflect an inappropriate culture where knowledge is being held to ransom, rather than being appropriately shared to enable and empower the people. {By sharing, I don't mean knowledge has to be available at zero fee, I mean it has to be available from a variety of alternative sources.}

..[23:48]..

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Revisions:
[17/02/2019] : Original
[26/02/2019] : Minor Edits

THE TECHNICAL WORKFORCE

{This is a from an earlier attempt at a journal back in 2003 (Voume 1; No:3), and was made available in pdf format on my personal web space now discontinued.. It has been available on scribd since 2011: MorfJV01003origin}

As a first estimate we will consider a simplified Pareto analysis. A Pareto model, suggests that we have two dependent variables, and that the majority of one is the cause of the minority in the other. Thus giving rise to names such as the: 80-20 rule or the 60-40 rule. A simple example of a Pareto model is that 80% of defects can be traced to 20% of all causes. Or that 80% of profits are derived from 20% of the products sold.

To apply this to engineering we make the assertion that:

80% of problems can be solved by applying 20% of our knowledge base.

Given that the typical 4 year Bachelor of engineering degree consists of at least 5 streams, one of which is general art and science subjects. We can conclude that each stream requires 9.6 calendar months, and if we conclude that only 1/4 of the general art and science stream is required for any of the other four streams, then we require an extra 2.4 calendar months for a self-contained study programme. That is a total of  12 calendar months for the entire study programme (eg. ¼ of the 4 year programme). Such a course can therefore be awarded an academic certificate, with the graduates becoming engineering technicians.

Level	Years of Education	% of Problems can Solve
Engineering Technicians	1 year (Cert)	80.00
Engineering Officers	2 year (Assoc. Dip.)	96.00
Engineering Technologists	3 year (B.Tech)	99.20
Engineers	4 year (B.Eng)	99.84
Éngineers	5 year (M.Eng)	99.96

In the above table I have made the assumption that each additional year of education permits the individual to solve 80% more of what is remaining. That is the Technician has a deficiency of 20%, the Officer can solve 80% of this 20%, resulting in an additional 16% of problems being capable of being solved. Resulting in the technologist being able to solve 80% of the remaining 4%, and so on.  Given this capability we would expect the work force to have the following distribution.

Level	Years of Education	% of Work Force
Engineering Technicians	1 year (Cert)	80.00
Engineering Officers	2 year (Assoc. Dip.)	16.00
Engineering Technologists	3 year (B.Tech)	3.200
Engineers	4 year (B.Eng)	0.640
Éngineers	5 year (M.Eng)	0.128

So the next question to consider is: Can we extend this concept backwards to account for no formal tertiary education, including no formal trade certificates? That is what capability does 2 years of additional schooling after 10 compulsory years of schooling count for? What value is the 10 years of schooling? What value is the first 5 years of schooling? And what value is the first 5 years of education in the hands of parents worth? Is our education system of any value?

Clearly by extending the concept backwards, the capabilities of individuals is going to be demonstrated to be increasingly deficient. So another question to ask is: Is the 80% capability at the 1 year Certificate level valid? Maybe 80% should be set for the 10 years of compulsory education? At this point however, I will stick with the certificate level. {Though I will indicate that I believe that grade 11 and grade 12 should be scrapped, and Trade and Tertiary education should start immediately after grade 10. Hence all the above mentioned levels will be completed with 2 years less education.}

To be able to extend the concept backwards we need a mathematical equation rather than a methodology. Attempting to extrapolate this concept backwards numerically results in the following curve. Which is not very useful, it suggests we all know nothing at the age of 17.


What we therefore want is an equation that has a value of zero for the proportion of knowledge at age zero, and increases from there forward. But which however, has an asymptote at 1, that is we never achieve 100% knowledge, we approach it, but never reach it. Further learning in the early years to be more slowly than in later years, once we have learnt to read, learning should become rapid, up until at point at which further increase in depth of knowledge becomes limited and vastly more difficult to achieve. The resultant formula as the following form:

Proportion of knowledge = 1-A.exp(-t.k)

Where ‘t’ is the time, and ‘A’ and ‘k’ are constants. To achieve results similar to our 80/20 rule the values of the constants are:

A = 1
k = c . tⁿ
n = 4
c = 1.53789E-06

For those familiar with learning curves, maybe you could replace  the above with a more formal learning curve.

This results in the following table:

Age	Level	Years of Education	% of Problems can Solve
15	School Leaver	Compulsory Only	68.90
16	Engineering Technicians	1 year (Cert)	80.06
17	Engineering Officers	2 year (Assoc. Dip.)	88.74
18	Engineering Technologists	3 year (B.Tech)	94.53
19	Engineers	4 year (B.Eng)	97.78
20	Éngineers	5 year (M.Eng)	99.27

Thus revisiting our distribution of the workforce we now have:

Level	Years of Education	% of Work Force
School Leaver	Compulsory Only	68.90
Engineering Technicians	1 year (Cert)	11.17
Engineering Officers	2 year (Assoc. Dip.)	8.67
Engineering Technologists	3 year (B.Tech)	5.79
Engineers	4 year (B.Eng)	3.25
Éngineers	5 year (M.Eng)	1.49

It should be noted that by my definitions, doctors, lawyers, politicians, architects, accountants, managers, are also technicians with increasing abilities. Everybody fits into the classifications. After all a surgeon is little different that a car mechanic, they just possess knowledge of a different system and have different tool kits. And more importantly neither is very good at diagnosing and fixing problems, leaving us with the adage that prevention is better than cure.

It should be noted that our new model now requires a greater proportion of the higher grades, compared with our original model. Hence whilst my original objective was to illustrate that the higher levels of education were a significant waste of global and community resources from an employment viewpoint, if you were to check national and state statistics, I have probably done the opposite. {Education as a matter of personal interest and curiosity is not being considered here. What we are considering here is the education required to sustain our technological systems, including society itself.}

To illustrate I will use some rather old statistics for South Australia extracted from the 1992 pocket yearbook for South Australia, and based on the 1986 census. I will leave it to readers to compare against up to date statistics.

Qualification	% of Population (?)	Grouping (%)
Not Stated	8.64	71.60
No Qualification	62.96
Other	3.73	20.44
Other Certificate	6.81
Trade certificate	9.90
Diploma	3.43	6.83
Bachelor Degree	3.40
Graduate Diploma	0.68	0.68
Higher Degree	0.46	0.46

Given that statistics at the time also indicate that 38.5% of population not in labour force, and that 5.7% of population were unemployed. Then it should be clear that if we adopt the model we have developed here, some incentive is required to push everybody higher up the educational hierarchy to remove unemployment.

However, it should be noted that the state statistics are not actually looking at education, they are looking at formal certification and recognition of learning. All attempts to improve our education system are actually focused on employment of teachers, they have little if anything to do with learning, education or qualification.

The disincentive towards higher levels of education are not actually disincentives to learning, rather most people have little desire to waste their time being told what they already know, and also in many circumstances, understand far better than the persons teaching. It is not education that is required but proper assessment and recognition of skills and knowledge held by individuals. That is we really need a national even international, independent examination board. Further more we need vastly improved quality assurance systems throughout all technological systems that form society. We need improved regulations and control systems.

The industrial revolution was built on the back of people learning to read and write, and then reaping the benefits of such abilities. The plans for one steam engine are published, and before you know it, steam engines are being built and experimented with throughout the country. Unfortunately whilst patents place inventions on public record they also stifle supply. Well, the extortionate demands of the owners of the patents stifle supply. In any case technology was not progressing as a consequence of special technical schools, it was developing as a consequence of individual interests, either for financial gain or just intellectual curiosity.

Engineering is stifled by universities and examinations. Engineering is about applying scientific knowledge to the development of new technologies. It is not about memorising facts and re-iterating them in examinations. It is of little value to society that one engineer can analyse a structure from first principles and do all the calculations in their head without need of computer, calculator, slide rule or log tables. Such intellectual capability is of no significance. In fact having the intellectual capacity to merely look at a building concept and know that it is not going to work, or even that it will work, is also of no value. For the community requires proof that the concept will work, before committing resources to its construction. Such proof is dependent upon communication and the level of the common intellect. The higher the common intellect, the simpler the proof’s need to be: that is you can leap ten steps in one bound and then go one step at a time. If the common intellect is low, then proof has to be presented one step at a time.

So we now have more books published than ever before, we also have the internet filled with electronic publications. Further more we also have access to computers and software that can perform all kinds of complex calculations, more importantly we can program these computers ourselves.

Thus whilst one person is wasting their time studying in a university and attempting to pass exams, another scholar can be reading a text book and programming a computer. The former graduates with a worthless scrap of paper (B.Eng) and proceeds to look for employment, the other graduates with a fully operational computer program that is sold to an increasing market place.

To close this issue: Engineering is about the application of science to develop technology. Either you have an interest in creating new technologies or you don’t. If you don’t have such interest then all an higher education will do is make you an higher level technician, it won’t make you an engineer. My model above is based on real engineers, not an educated elite. If the upper levels are merely an educated elite with no imagination, no ingenuity then educating them to that level of knowledge is of no value. It is the non-conformists, that we need to encourage to the higher levels. Truth is not reached by agreeing with examiners: that the earth is flat and at the centre of universe. It is reached by a failure to understand and comprehend the models presented, and a desire and interest in seeking a better understanding of reality: not a better understanding of the models.

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Related Posts:

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Issues/Releases:
[10/08/2003] : Original
[17/11/2011] : Scribd
[06/01/2016] : Blogger/Original

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Revsions:
[06/01/2016] : Original

Moving forward with Associate Technologists #pt1

The idea of renaming engineering associate/officers to Associate Technologists is starting to grow on me. It fits with my previously stated objective of removing the words engineer and engineering from my vocabulary. I've not checked but not aware of it being used elsewhere. Though I have always had objections to the use of the term engineering technologist. To me technologist is someone who studies the relationship between technology and humanity: both geographically and historically. Such discipline emerged because engineers, whether fabricators or designers have and continue to play scant regard to the impact of technology on our world. Engineers have low status primarily because they do not serve a higher ethic, rather they serve their capitalist and/or war mongering masters. They generate pollution and weapons of mass destruction. Our cities don't so much as provide freedom, but a a prison make. Drones in a hive. So using the word "technologist" to refer to these crunchers of numbers, drafters of pictures, and writers of reports seems diminishing to the discipline even if qualified by tacking engineering on the front. However I want to drop the prefix engineering, and never refer to engineer or engineering.

Most things on the internet relate technology to computers and the internet and related hardware and software. It is technology that people have genrally been concerned with. The Luddites arose because of technology: machines and automation. It is technology that people seek to solve a variety of problems, it is technology that modern society is built on. Engineering is a process and technology is the result. Since I spend my time dealing with products for which there was no techno-scientific input, my interest is getting people to seek the appropriate people for assistance in the first place. It is typically easier to design something to be compliant than to prove some existing thing is compliant. The problem with things that are merely built, is that they are built for a limited purpose, and that purpose they typically fullfill. However societies mandated performance requirements extend beyond the limited purpose. Often societies wants are unwarranted and it is necessary for persons to take the gatekeepers to task and get them to justify their position.

REGULATORY CONTROL
Take building control, or more generally development approval as we call it here in South Australia. Most buildings are designed by:

1) Owner-Builders
2) Builders
3) Building Designers
4) Plan Drafters

Or to be more strictly correct the buildings are ultimately designed by:

1) Building Surveyors
2) Building Survey Technicians
3) Other building officials employed by councils.

This latter situation is not the intent of the development act, but it is what most happens in practice. The first group of people don't really design anything, they simply attempt to describe what they want and propose to do, or often what they have already done. The people in the first group do not defend their proposals, they do not declare they have deliberately attempted to comply with codes of practice and good design practice. Rather they bounce their proposals back and forth to council, basically asking: "tell me what you want, what do I have to do to get approval?". Since the building officials are not in the role of designer, and strictly speaking they loose status as an independent approving authority if they give design advice. The result is that the building officials don't consider all issues when supplying advice and guidance. If the building official hasn't assessed everything then after changes are made other faults will arise with the proposal. The result the proposal will get bounced back and forth until everyone gets tired and the thing reaches near full compliance. That is to say if the proposal was passed onto someone else and they assess it with a fresh mind they are likely to find other faults. It is also the case that the documentation produced by those in the first group is also relatively poor, it has thus been pointed out that often the primary reason that the councils ask for engineers reports is that there is a good chance that they get some decent drawings. Doesn't always work though, and the engineers just produce calcs-for-council. It is also the case that cannot send the people away to get architects drawings, or drawings produced by a decent drafter. So it becomes a matter of individual choice as to whether decent drawings and written specifications are really needed.

Some builders produce excellent drawings, and they do so, because it is helpful to go through the process of construction on paper before tackling the job for real. So getting someone else to draw it up, defeats the purpose. Unfortunately the majority of the industry sees drawings as unnecessary paperwork.
Builders have turned up at the office, and they have said they just want calcs-for-council, its just a matter of the span, 90% of the time they get approval with out problems. I ask if their carpenters often have to stop part way through construction and buy additional materials. The response is usually yes. Thats when I start drawing extra structural members on their plans, and section lines and start asking about details. Connection details for which they cannot provide any answers. Responses tend to be industry standard practice. My response is everyone one I ask, does things differently. They say something like to the code, I say the code has about 100 different details, which one do they use. Rule one: never ask what they do by offering options. What ever you say that will be what they do. It's necessary to get them to commit to and say what they do.

These businesses would save themselves and everyone else a great deal of hassle if they employed people with a formal techno-scientific education on their staffs. They don't want engineers, and they don't really need engineers, engineers are likely to get bored to death. Its the same with the technical, and engineering software companies.Most businesses which may benefit from the software have the software, and the software they currently have works just fine they have no desire to upgrade. Most other businesses which may benefit from the technology in the software, don't want the current offerings. For example there are still people producing architectural and engineering drawings by hand. Freehand workshop details tend to be more readable than scale drawings. The objective is not to produce a virtual reality but communicate an idea to be transformed into reality. Scale drawings can be a good check on the dimensional fit, but tradition more based on arithmetic, bringing together dimensions from large scale drawings with details from small scale drawings. CADD can do this arithmetic and drawing at the same time, but can otherwise be a hindrance to good communication. Additionally CADD can take longer than producing a simple freehand sketch. So there are people who are not using drawing boards and drawing instruments, so moving over to CADD not a high priority.

But are timber estimators fully covering all the requirements needed for a structurally adequate timber framed house? Can the house dreamed up actually be built? Who is checking such things? Its not the building officials. Development approval is not about whether it can be built or not. If development approval wasn't there people would just go ahead and build. Being able to build the thing is the building proponents problem. Development approval is concerned about whether it should be permitted to exist in the built environment and will it present a hazard or inconvenience to the public. Put simply approval can be granted for the impossible as well as the impractical. So that have the situation that builders contract to build the impossible, and carpenters subcontract to build the impossible. Halfway through construction it will become apparent to the carpenter whilst stuck up a roof that the building cannot be built. That is the wrong time to conclude such things. The whole point of techno-scientific training is to avoid such problems by planning and design.

When the 1993 development act came into being, most councils stopped their official building inspections. A few years later a recommendation of 20% of development applications approved should be inspected, and irrespective of reached the 20% or not significant developments should be inspected. Last year the recommendation was changed to 66% for those involving a licensed builder, and 90% for those not involving a licensed builder. It thus basically confirming the inspectors view at the time of the new act that problems would arise if checks weren't made.

I disagree. Its the QC versus QA issue. Quality Control (QC) is permitting defects and then filtering them out and resolving issues associated with. Basically QC is closing the gate after the horse has bolted. Quality Assurance (QA) on the other hand is about attempting to avoid the problem in the first place, it is built around designing quality in. When the 1993 development act was introduced there were attempts to introduce QA ideas, but it was resisted and didn't really happen. The ideas however were flawed and based on ISO:9000. The ideas were based on too much paper shuffling and collection of signatures. Signatures collected to allocate blame. There was a mismatch between responsiblility and authority. Such is not acceptable in a true QA system.

AUTHORITY AND RESPONSIBILITY
For example I have no authority to go on site and ensure my design is complied with, further more contractual relationships are typically a screw up. Builder typically requests the work, but invoice is typically to a person never seen, the future owner. Gets more complicated with manufacturers. Then there are supermarkets who want to impose discounts, and have consultants sign same suppliers contract as spud farmers and the like. There are those who think they have something worthy of a patent and want consultants to sign intellectual property agreements before they discuss anything: basically tell them to clear off.

The basic issue however is that the owners typically don't want to pay for what regulations have mandated. For example if build a carport typically require a rain water tank (I cannot remember whether its retention or detention). Anycase the documentation is approved on basis of it going in. But the carport builders don't supply or install. It is left to the owners to install the rainwater tank, and most don't. If downpipe draining to garden probably not an issue, if draining to street then an issue. The whole purpose is to slow stormwater to the street mains, because it isn't large enough for the current style of housing. When the stormwater mains were installed large gardens were the trend, now much larger houses with paved outdoor living areas is the trend. So the water has to be retained on site until after the storm is over and then slowly released to the stormwater mains: and so reducing local flooding.

Similar situation is the required strengthening of the existing house structure prior to attaching a carport. The carport builders sell a carport, submit building approval plans, get a request for further information, obtains engineering for strengthening the house. Then as far as I know they go ahead as usual, because the cost of strengthening the house was not involved in the original contract fee, further they've never had to do so in the past. But then they were building smaller carports and it was being ignored. Basically the owner is constantly placed in the position of owner-builder, and left responsible for the complete construction. Strengthening the house is cumbersome and consequently labour expensive. It can add a significant delay before the carport/verandah can be built, and a huge additional fee. People just want the carport/verandah, thats all they want to pay for, all they do pay for, and all they get.

The newly imposed inspections are largely because of roof truss failures. Roof trusses are a problem when it comes to original design, and installation as well as future modifications. However it is not really check lists and inspections which are required to bring about improvements. It was not the loss of the official building inspectors and their inspections that was and is the problem. I contend the problem is poor demarcation of authority and responsibility. There is too much division of labour and coordination is poor.

ACADEMIC PROGRAMMES
What we need is proper planning, design and management of this established technology. I contend that this does not require pushing to the higher levels of the Australian qualification framework (AQF), but multiskilling at the level of AQF-6 [Advanced Diploma or Associate Degree]. I contend that AQF-6 down meets the fundamental needs of industry and society, that AQF-7 upwards meets higher personal needs and are not necessary to society. Most occupational awards contain breadth of knowledge, rising in levels of the AQF should increase depth of knowledge, and that should be clear within a given body of knowledge. Depth of knowledge is currently poorly defined. But breath of knowledge is relatively clear and apparent to everyone.

So for example I contend that if a B.Eng in civil engineering and a B.Eng in mechanical engineering both produce engineers, then the common title can only come from a common core and that common core is a 1 year diploma in engineering science or a 2 year Associate Degree in engineering science. If we look at the NCEES FE/PE exams, it becomes apparent that most engineering disciplines are defined by 5 major areas of practice. At present at most, B.Eng programmes only have a single common year. That leaves 3 years out of 4, to cover 5 major areas of practice, and discipline specific depth of the fundamentals of engineering. That is a total of 6 streams in 3 years, or one half a year per stream.

Therefore a 2 year Associate Degree programme can be defined by 1 year of Fundamentals of Engineering (FE) and 1/2 year FE discipline specific depth, and 1/2 year for single area of practice. It should be noted that most graduates once employed tend to concentrate on a single area of practice, and otherwise have difficulty moving over to another area of practice.  A fundamental principle of the AQF is mobility and articulation from one occupation to another as the needs of the economy require. So whilst the B.Eng may provide some mobility at start of career, it otherwise is no help in the future. More appropriate organisation of the body of knowledge will achieve better mobility throughout a persons career. So go for the B.Eng if interested in profession, but don't go giving me a hard time telling me rubbish about who is best qualified for the job. The B.Eng doesn't have anything to do with the job, it is too general, and a great deal of additional knowledge is required to actually perform the job properly. This additional knowledge can be presented in shorter academic programmes, simply by changing the scheduling of subjects. Persons with a B.Eng in civil engineering do not spend 4 years studying structures. Further more they have limited to no architectural and building knowledge, hindering their communications with others in the industry. Put simply they are not trained for the industry but for their profession. But the professional bodies are increasingly failing to provide the additional training required to meet the needs of their associated industries. The same applies to B.Eng mechanical, and electrical who also enter the building industry. More so if consider that many mechanical are petrol heads, car freaks, but end up working in HVAC, putting huge holes in building structures. Why? One because they forgot all about mechanics, and secondly because they would rather be somewhere else and are not paying attention.

The problem with occupational degrees is that educating people, and then they cannot get a job putting that knowledge to work: either the job lacks breadth or it lacks depth. Or the job simply lacks the resources to get motivated and make things happen: everything becomes a series of political and economical obstacles and no real power to resolve. So I say scrap the occupational degrees, have the higher degrees but don't relate them to occupations, and have higher standards for passing. Don't repeat the habit of the past and say the degree is required to do the job. It isn't, degrees have never been necessary to do the job: that is lazy human resource management. Minimum knowledge is required to do the job along with ability to apply such knowledge. The mistake of the past is assuming that university graduates can all make significant improvements where they are employed: then distorting those academic programmes to a standardised knowledgebase to fit the industry. That is taking a bad idea, ensuring the next generation is fully conversant with it and advocate for, and then flooding the industry with it. Then wondering what went wrong. The traditional graduates with their degrees brought improvements precisely because they weren't trained for the industry but were conversant with the industry. They introduced fresh ideas, rather than sustaining and spreading stagnant ideas.

Tradition was starting in industry and moving into education, night school was important. The original associate diploma programmes for engineering associates were 4 year part time programmes (2 year fulltime equivalent), with most studies scheduled in the evenings, with may be the odd subject requiring day release from work. People were working and developing proficiency, competency and confidence, and the studies of increasing relevance as they found use for them at work, and took on more challenging projects.

But economic down turns, and high levels of unemployment resulted in people staying at school longer and moving onto higher education, getting a degree has basically become an expected norm. But its not good because the scheduling of the academic programmes is all out of whack with the needs of society and industry. We need to get competent people into industry fast, and fast tracking B.Eng to 3 years through summer programmes is the wrong way to do it. Trades people who later get a B.Eng are generally better practical engineers than those who went straight from school. By practical engineers, I mean that what they design can be built, and built safely. They have a better understanding of workers on the factory floor and the construction site, because they have been there. The school leaver engineers tend to focus more on the analysis and mathematics, not the real engineering, unless their education had a bias on manufacturing and construction, and the problems of "over-the-wall-design".

A principle of QA is that the journey is more important than the destination. I want the journey to engineer to be long, and of high quality. So my preference is stepping through AQF levels 1 to 6, and spending significant time there before moving upto levels 7 and 8.

Articulation requires definable common cores preferably in terms of other AQF awards, therefore the first common year of the B.Eng programme would be a 1 year AQF-5 Diploma in Engineering Science, and this itself should be broken down into lower level AQF awards. Also the 2 year programme described above contained all the engineering science, but only a single area of practice. A single area of practice does not require the entire breadth of engineering science. So an alternative 2 year programme can be defined adding more engineering practice and deleting unnecessary engineering science. Thus end up with multiple pathways, a plethora of qualifications some have suggested. The latter is not intended nor desirable, however one qualification contending to be covering everything is also not desirable.

Where we have established technologies it is necessary to develop and sustain an established body of knowledge. The B.Eng lacks adequate coverage of engineering practice, and Masters of Engineering Practice only add to diminishing the value of masters degrees. A 2 year programme can stick to the subject matter and contain more engineering practice material. So a 2 year Associate Degree in Structural Design can focus on the most common structural forms likely to be encountered: and cover architectural and building as necessary. Such qualifications can be quickly adapted to meet the needs of specific industry sectors.

First collapse to 1 year AQF diploma of structural design, from there it can be extended to an AQF advanced diploma to meet a single or multiple industry needs. For example there is the balustrade industry, industrial racking industry, precast concrete industry. Few of these industries require full time structural engineers, and often they rely on external consultants. The businesses would be far better of if they employed techno-scientific personnel on staff in the form of Associate Technologists, that way when they do call upon external consultants they get higher quality services. Basically many of these businesses hold standard calculations, reports and certificates in a form which is basically chaos.

Associate Technologists would help to bring order to the chaos, reduce delays when interacting with regulating authorities, and more importantly actually defend the product. As I stated above much of what is imposed by regulatory authorities is unwarranted, many simply impose the rules with no knowledge of origin and intent of the rules. Sometimes this is good, other times it is the cause of hazard and inconvenience. Plan drafters simply complying results in bad design. The Associate Technologists can defend their design.

The current argument of the engineers is about being smarter and more intelligent or something. But that is not the real issue. The issue is having the right knowledge about the established technologies. It is about following established procedures for assessing expected performance of those established technologies and achieving it in practice.

Achieving the necessary competence, requires supervision under the right people, if the right people have never been established in the work place, then it is necessary to provide greater level of formal academic training to achieve the desired outcome. Given the basic AQF awards describe foundational knowledge and enabling competence, an additional AQF certificate of practice is therefore required to cover recognition of having acquired a few hundred hours of practice in a given area. For example an entire year spent working on realistic project work, only instead of it being sent to regulatory officials for approval, it is instead sent to academic supervisors who carry out more rigorous assessment than real officials. The purpose of the academic system should be to improve what is in the world outside and foster higher discipline in action taken.

Degrees were equated to higher pay, and everyone was basically pushed to get a degree to get a better job, government couldn't afford such education and so education was largely commercialised. But it was nonsense, higher pay comes from good fortune in the market place: being in the right place at the right time with the right product in thr right condition, at the right price. Chances are your occupational degree is a product that doesn't meet any of these requirements: and as a graduate you are left with nothing to sell. It was never the degree it was always what the individual could and can do with knowledge learnt. So until learnt something that you can do something unique with, you haven't learnt the right thing.

So my interest is bashing the tree of knowledge or better described as the web of knowledge around, to create alternative programmes and schedules. For both are a matter of subjective opinion. Educated here and there, I know that teachers tend to talk rubbish about what you can learn and when: their views are biased by local schedules not human capability.

Now the articulation requirements of the AQF is important to the concepts of vocation, occupation, profession or career. Whilst we need timber designers, and steel designers and industrial racking designers and such, we don't want to create such things or be such things. That takes us back to similar situation to having the welder, the slag chipper, and the slag chippers mate or whatever crazy divisions of labour existed in the metal industry before it was rationalised. The problem was relatively unskilled jobs which could be taught fairly quickly, but having restrictions on who could and could not do the work: the purpose being to protect employment. The result extremely inefficient workplace, in which new technologies cannot be adopted.

So we don't educate steel designer or timber designer, but structural designer, or Associate Technologist Structures. But we need to know they have their AQF certificate of practice in timber and/or steel, or industrial racking or what ever the specific material or technology may be. Getting a bachelor degree instead of the associate degree won;t resolve the issue, because it doesn't cover the engineering practice required for the given technology: it only covers the science which may be applicable. If the graduate is not supervised by the right people then there is no guarantee that they will apply the applicable science correctly to the technology.

The purpose here is to cut the irrelevant science, and get more of the technology specific engineering practice into the academic education programmes, and further academic training programmes to develop proficiency to create habitual instinct. That is able to respond to common questions with a known solutions rather than I need to go do some calculations. New training is required. Well actually probably old training, training similar to that of the original military engineers: lots of bullshine: as my Warlord annual described it. Take the canon apart, polish it, put it back together, and do it again and again. Then go into battle and get stuck in the mud, but the response is automatic and habitual: not an obstacle but a mere inconvenience.

The structural steel designer knows the answer in steel, the structural engineer often doesn't. When the structural engineer has become a structural analyst, an applied mathematician and the steel designer has been lost or never emerged, then have a dangerous industrial environment. Such designers did exist and were an important part of the design team, they have been largely lost, or replaced by computer software. Not engineers replaced by computer software, but steel designers and structural analysts. Don't need to know about steel or timber design, because the software can check it: but it cannot design nor does it know the solutions. I dislike most software because it only looks at a point on a complex design curve. If look at a curve can more readily see if made a mistake and some perspective of tolerance. If calculated a single point value, have no real clue as to where you are: don't know if actually kept on design curve and no concept of tolerance. Experience generates a collection of design points in your head, but a random collection is still not a continuous curve.

So I would like to get techno-scientific personnel into the small businesses which are 95% of all businesses. They may not have need for structures, but they have need for technology of some form or other and need for industrial mathematics and industrial science of some description. Which is part of the reason for dropping engineering and just refer to Associate Technologist and Technologist. For example I don't think food technologists would gain membership of IEAust: even though applied science, and not just measuring stuff, but also creating new products. Similarly industrial designers and architects would be excluded, along with computer scientists, and computer programmers. In short many occupations concerned with technology and its design and development are excluded from joining Engineers Australia. Engineering is something specific, and upto date apparently not. There are chemical engineers and computer systems engineers: but really has the common body of knowledge really brought about a transformation to engineer.

So far I've focused on AQF-6 Associate Degree. But really need to get down to AQF-1 certificate I and work upto Certificate IV. Typically Certificate I is an entry level work qualification. Whilst Certificate III is the typical trade level qualification. By the way the AQF exists for the purpose of assisting employers find the right people. My general view is to scrap grade 11 and grade 12. A typical degree is 3 years, but if include matriculation studies then it takes 5 years after the 10 years of compulsory education. Associate degrees in foundational studies are becoming common as alternative pathways, especially for mature entry studies, these can cut time off bachelor degree programmes. So a 4 year B.Eng is actually 6 years beyond school. So TAFE qualifications not dependent on grade 11 or grade 12, can cut duration to 2 years total to get a useful qualification: not the B.Eng, but into techno-scientific occupation of some description with the potential to progress.

So basically saying that the 2 years of matriculation, now the senior secondary certificate of education (SSCE) should be replaced by a more formal AQF-6 award, the Associate Degree in say liberal studies. But further that grade 11 becomes AQF-5 Diploma in liberal studies. That this iself is broken down into certificates.

Now taking a certificate I, as 1/5th of a year. Note meanings of qualifications can change dependent on area of practice and/or body of knowledge. A certificate I in applied mathematics is not equal to certificate I in say hairdressing: they have completely different bodies of knowledge and the break down of that knowledge and division of labour completely different. Mathematics is also foundation of many other things. So take about 6 subjects in grade 11 and 5 in grade 12. So mathematics 1 study unit in grade 11, but 2 in grade 12. Therefore total of 3/5ths of a year in mathematics: therefore equivalent certificate III in mathematics. Other subjects only amount to 2/5ths so only equate to certificate II,  with one subject no more than certificate I. So basically get 5 certificates, for example:

Certificate I English
Certificate II Geography
Certificate II Chemistry
Certificate II Physics
Certificate III Mathematics

Another issue is that grade 10 itself is without real recognition and award. That is 10 years of education which is basically useless. Suggest that this also be properly integrated in the AQF. This closely approximates the old O-levels and A-levels, which I think has now been abandoned in the UK for NVQ's, but still available in some commonwealth countries.

From the simple list above can now start to ask questions, like what does the B.Eng advance? Do they get to a Certificate IV in mathematics or Diploma? To me Mathematics is a real knowledge stream, where as engineering is not. Also physics and chemistry are heaviliy biased towards mathematics and therefore could be classed as applied mathematics. And applied mathematics probably best scheduled before pure mathematics. So potentially drop the physics and chemistry back to Certificate I and push the mathematics up to diploma. So that get:

Certificate I English
Certificate II Geography
Certificate I Chemistry
Certificate I Physics
Diploma Applied Mathematics

Where the certificates in physics and chemistry focus on the qualitative aspects and laboratory work, and the quantitative aspects are shifted to applied mathematics. It then becomes apparent that it is possible to schedule all the mathematics in grade 12, and all the other subjects in grade 11.

When we look more closely at a B.Eng program we see therefore an increase in the depth of the applied mathematics qualification, and minor coverage of qualitative issues in science and technology. So is the B.Eng just a substandard degree in industrial mathematics by another name? What is there in the study of mechanics that is not mathematics? What in the study of thermofluid dynamics that is not mathematics? The design of a structure is not mathematics. The design of fluid power control system is not mathematics? Factory automation and programming PLC's is not mathematics. But the final assessment of the designs may involve mathematics, and mathematical relationships may guide design decisions whilst sketching ideas out. So applied mathematics is helpful and often important, but not always necessary. So there is an issue of when and where to slot it into a study programme.

I say isolate study streams and explicitly identify equivalences on built up awards. So the collection above is replaced by Associate Degree in Technical Science. If collection of subjects biased towards the humanities it would become Associate Degree in Humanities. When consider that grade 11 and grade 12 have a lot of repetition, can also consider compressing the subject matter and including more practical technical topics if going to refer to technical science. For example starting point for applied mathematics being technical drawing, moving onto to geometry and trigonometry. So now shifted to needed content of certificate I in Technical Science. Grade 11 and 12 does not deal with industrial or technical science, it is really aimed at the traditional degrees: BSc and BA. Once again these were and are about profession and personal status, not the needs of industry or society. The knowledge has to be put to use to be useful, and that generally requires oppportunity. So need to get people into industry, asking questions and then seeking knowledge. Rather than acquiring knowledge, entering industry and doing nothing with the knowledge, and otherwise thinking know the answers. Got to ask questions first, and people not taught the standard process, typically ask questions about why its done that way. So people need to be given the opportunity to unleash their potential, and that mostly requires getting them into the workforce at some entry level position whilst still studying.

Sun 2012-Aug-12  03:21AM