IMHO it’s sad to say that the whole dual B1 and B2 is direct consequence of the visible drop in engineering standards over the past 20 years or so (then having dual qualifications was very unusual) with the rot starting with the loss of the aural exam.
With the aural woe betide anyone who went in without a thorough knowledge of all the fundamentals. You would probably be found out and sent packing quite quickly….Now with the multi-choice modules (which are in itself and mockery to the original full syllabus exams you had to endure) you can skim learn the questions and with a lot less background revision, pass. And even if you fail a module take it again no problem….!.With no end aural there is no incentive to do any in-depth learning of the entire syllabus
I have seen it happen quite a few times now to know this is how it is done….
The consequence of this as somebody else has stated in the thread is that very rarely is somebody actually proficient in both disciplines (ability to sign is not counted)
The sad thing is while people are doing dual licences for maybe their own markability they are also shooting the whole profession in the foot as it is allowing the industry too say, ‘hey this is a good thing why employ two engineers when we can employ one?!’…..The end result is that people are simply reducing the overall engineering job pool required. The proof is in the adverts. I have seen quite a few contract adverts that require specifically a dual traded engineer only. That would have been however two jobs years ago…..:-( And do you get double the pay !!! ???
How long is it going to be before the minimum standard to get a normal Licenced engineer’s job will be full B1/B2 ? And it will come eventually the beancounters will see to that - people complain about pay now, what about doubling the workload…?
Last edited by Just an Engineer; 18th December 2007 at 19:51.