Thread: Engineer Disparity

Ever noticed that an engineering degree, and in some cases an architect degree, may can get you through certification and licensing requirements in home inspection and related fields? Why?

I've worked with too many engineers who were totally inept in their own field much less something like home inspection. They were good for meetings, generating proposals, and other non-hands on work. Engineering school does not prepare one for the real world. Oh, you have to learn to eat and breath calculus but they don't teach technical skills. That you have to get from co-oping, internships, or on-the-job training.

Short story: Senior Mechanical Engineer decides he is going to be a contractor and build houses, on the side. One day he comes into the office moaning and groaning about building inspectors. Then he asks, "How are you supposed to know all that stuff?"

Are you smarter than a EE with a PhD? Answer this: What is a D-cell?

Note on technical skills statement above: Okay I did learn how to throw and put up a measuring chain and basic transit and level use for Civil Engineering at VT way back in the slide rule days.

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Ever noticed that an engineering degree, and in some cases an architect degree, may can get you through certification and licensing requirements in home inspection and related fields? Why?

SB: Because there are a lot of them and they have a bigger lobby.

I've worked with too many engineers who were totally inept in their own field much less something like home inspection. They were good for meetings, generating proposals, and other non-hands on work.

SB: I have met their ilk.

Engineering school does not prepare one for the real world.

SB: This is true of most "higher education" in this country. The "higher" referring mostly to the costs involved. It is notable that most architectural schools do not require students to study anything at all to do with residential buildings. Most do not require hands-on epxerience.

Short story: Senior Mechanical Engineer decides he is going to be a contractor and build houses, on the side.

SB: There are many of these in my area. Pet builders in the more expensive parts of town. No construction experience, just an engineering degree is something totally unrealted - and contacts.

"The most important thing is to keep the most important thing the most important thing." - From the book "Foundation design", by Coduto, Donald P.

Donald P. Coduto is currently a professor of geotechnical engineering and chair of the Civil Engineering Department at California State Polytechnic University, Pomona. He earned a BS in civil engineering from California Stat Polytechnic University, Pomona, an MS in geotechnical engineering from the University of California, Berkeley, and an MBA from Claremont Graduate University. He is an ASCE Fellow, a licensed civil engineer and a licensed geotechnical engineer, and has worked on a variety of geotechnical projects for both private and public sector clients.