There has been substantial activity and some changes on the international side of the Engineering Council’s work. These include numerous European meetings and events and the addition of a new International Affairs Manager, Dave Clark, to the Professional Standards team. Please see the New faces at the Engineering Council article here for more on his appointment.

International Engineering Alliance

The Engineering Council is the UK partner in the International Engineering Alliance (IEA). It oversees international agreements relating to the mutual recognition of accredited and approved engineering education and professional engineering competence. These agreements help engineers and technicians wishing to work in other member nations to have their accredited qualifications and competence recognised.

The IEA met in June and agreed some key decisions in relation to the Washington, Sydney and Dublin Accords. Engineers Australia and the Malaysian Board for Engineers were renewed as signatories of the Washington Accord and the China Association for Science and Technology (CAST) was approved as a full member. In UK terms this Accord recognises programmes accredited for Chartered Engineer registration. Members of all the Accords are periodically reviewed to ensure their accredited programmes and competence standards still meet the level required by the IEA. 

Members of the Sydney Accord unanimously approved Peru’s ICACIT as a provisional signatory on this Accord, while Engineers Ireland, the Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology (ABET) in the USA and the Canadian Council of Technicians and Technologists (CCTT) were approved to remain as members. The same three organisations have also been approved to remain signatories of the Dublin Accord. The Sydney Accord, in UK terms, recognises programmes accredited for Incorporated Engineer registration. The Dublin Accord relates to recognising technician qualifications, such as registration as an Engineering Technician or ICT Technician in the UK.

Alongside recognising education programmes and qualifications, the IEA also oversees agreements relating to competence standards for practising engineers and technicians. The Agreement for International Engineering Technicians was established in June 2015 to facilitate international mobility of engineering technicians by recognising their professional competence against an international standard. It will lead to the creation of an international register of engineering technicians, to complement the existing international registers for Incorporated and Chartered Engineers. Before the register could be created the founder members, including the Engineering Council, had to carry out mutual assessments to make sure that the registration requirements for engineering technicians in each member nation met the threshold set out in the Agreement. At the IEA meeting in June 2016, these assessments were approved. More information about this Agreement is at http://www.ieagreements.org/AIET/