An Engine for Change - A Chronicle of the Engineering Council

1988-1990: THE BARLOW YEARS 71The EngC ExaminationsThe Syllabi for EngC Examinations were reviewed during 1988 and modifications proposedthat became effective in 1989. In addition, a major publicity campaign was launched in July1989, using press releases, leaflets and posters, to raise awareness that the EngCexaminations were “The Alternative Route to the Academic Standard for CharteredEngineer”. This campaign brought in over 6,000 enquiries from the UK alone. During theyear more courses were established to prepare students for the examinations. It wasdetermined that from 1990 the EngC examination would be of honours degree standard, tomatch the raised standards required by SARTOR.For the EngC examinations in 1990 there were 3,920 candidates at 37 UK and 57 overseascentres, an increase over 1989 of 16% in the UK and 7% in overseas candidates. Courses toprepare for the examination were encouraged, two new ones being planned for Scotland in1991. In 1992 there were to be two more (Northern Ireland and East Anglia), together withothers in Hong Kong, Malaysia, Sri Lanka and Trinidad.Other Further and Higher Education ActivitiesThe EngC, determined to improve the numbers of undergraduates studying engineering inBritish universities, published ‘Admissions to Universities: action to increase the supply ofEngineers’ in November 1988. During that year the trustees of the National EngineeringScholarships scheme, following a 1987 agreement between the DES and the EngC, agreed afinancial plan to enable the scholarships to be wound up by 1991 as by then the schemewould have served its purpose.With the National Association of Teachers in Further and Higher Education (NATFHE) theEngC organised, in June 1989, a joint conference for teachers in further education and othersinterested in skills shortages. The impact of demography and the impact of the 1988Education Reform Act were analysed, using case studies and other examples. Also during1989 the EngC cooperated with the Standing Conference on University Entrance (SCUE) andothers to make engineering higher education as accessible and attractive as possible toindividuals who had vocational and non-traditional qualifications.The Universities Funding Council (UFC) and the Polytechnics and Colleges Funding Council(PCFC) were set up during 1989, replacing the existing funding bodies - the UniversityGrants Committee and the National Advisory Body for Further and Higher Education. TheEngC used this opportunity to update its 1984 policy statement on Resources for EngineeringEducation; this was undertaken in cooperation with the Committee for Engineering in thePolytechnics, the Standing Committee of Heads of Engineering in Colleges and Institutes ofHigher Education, the Standing Conference on University Entrance, the Royal Society ofArts, Industry Matters and the Training Agency. The result was sent as a discussiondocument ‘Restructuring Engineering Higher Education’ for comment to the UFC and to thePCFC, with copies being sent also to all higher educational institutions. The associatedrecommendations on staff:student ratios and on technical and secretarial support and onequipment requirements were welcomed. The EngC, in a cooperative effort with theEngineering Professors’ Conference, published a summary of responses to the discussiondocument in November 1989. All this activity was not in vain as after eight years of decline,there was an encouraging increase in applications for places on engineering higher educationcourses during 1990.© Engineering Council UK 2004