Sounds like a racket, especially given that the PEO is a private organization. I’m not sure why this is supposed to be a good thing.

> Everyone who graduates from an accredited engineering program in Canada has to take an ethics course and has these rules drilled into their heads.

It bothers me that people believe that A) ethics can be taught like any other engineering class and B) ethics should be prescribed by some professional association.

> But then I graduated and half the people I run in to at hackathons and conferences did a two week bootcamp

I agree this is a problem, but most of the actual engineers I meet in real life (i.e. people who did a 4-or-more year accredited engineering program, including some who are from Canada) don’t actually have a particularly impressive level of rigor that would set them apart from most of the college-educated programmers I meet.

The US has the same basic system, all that is different is how strictly the word "engineer" is regulated. And that varies by state.

Before that system was adopted, bridges fell down an average of once a week in the USA. We have a lot more and bigger bridges now, but not nearly as many fall down.

Read https://www.amazon.com/Professional-Software-Development-Sch... for case for doing the same thing for software development.

Dunno why you need the qualifier there. There are public and nonprofit rackets, too.

That's also a requirement in Canada (Ontario at least). Work experience has to be completed while working under a P.Eng.

They care about having a legal lever to manipulate so that there is proof that you should have known better.

A better translation of engineer would be "technicien".

French "ingénieurs" come from "Grandes écoles", see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grandes_%C3%A9coles

[1] http://www.peo.on.ca/index.php?ci_id=2075&la_id=1#whypeng [2] http://www.peo.on.ca/index.php?ci_id=2075&la_id=1#aftergrad [3] https://www.ontario.ca/laws/statute/90p28#BK36

Found it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_Ring

So Canada has no arms industry? I call shenanigans.

Whether or not Canada has an arms industry is irrelevant to the question of whether or not it's unethical to build weapons.

Having an ethical obligation and acting on it are two different things. People can argue about the philosophy around the ethics of creating weapons. It could be argued that every engineer working on creating weapons is violating the ethical requirements of being an engineer.

If that were true, wouldn't the professional body expel them from membership? Or perform some other form of sanction? Which it hasn't - ever, to my knowledge.

Personally I don't see a problem with this. That's their job title. Whether they have a P. Eng and can legally sign documents is another matter.

You are correct that technically they cannot walk around saying "I am a Software Engineer" unless they are a Professional Engineer. But I don't see the harm of someone saying "I work as a Software Engineer in X company" because:

- that's their job title

- the company chose the title and hired them for that role knowing their qualifications

- to my knowledge there are no legal restrictions on what title a company can give a role

If you want to go after someone calling themselves a "Software Engineer" when they're not a P. Eng I would argue you should go after the company for advertising an "engineer" position without hiring a P. Eng.

Edit: my argument here is that professional engineer licensing bodies should go after companies hiring engineering graduates to fill an "X Engineer" role the same as they would go after an individual falsely claiming to be a P.Eng.

It's stupid to allow companies to hire someone without a P.Eng to an "Engineer" role and then chastise the person for calling themselves by their job title.

The meaning of engineering on the other hand has been watered down to be meaningless. There are no professional standards and no control on what companies represent their staff to be. It sounds prestigious as a title, but that’s about the end of it.

For some disciplines like Software Engineering, I agree.

For other disciplines like Civil engineering, the term has not been watered down. No company would hire someone to certify designs who was not a P. Eng because they are required to employ a P.Eng for this by regulations/law.

This problem has come up because the government/PEO has not reacted to the changing engineering landscape and don't require positions like "Software Engineer" to be filled by an actual P. Eng.

Companies made the title worthless. I don't see how it's fair to fault the person in the position because there is a double standard applied to individuals and companies regarding the term "Engineer"

Apply the standard both ways. People cannot call themselves an "Engineer" unless they hold a P.Eng and companies cannot hire anyone but a P.Eng for an "X Engineer" position.

From [1]: Becoming licensed gives you the right to use “P.Eng.” after your name and “engineer” in your job title. Under the Professional Engineers Act, you may only use “engineer” in your job title if you hold a P.Eng. licence.

So yes, I'd agree that companies shouldn't be using engineer in the job title unless they're hiring a P.Eng, but that doesn't absolve the employee of liability.

[1]http://www.peo.on.ca/index.php?ci_id=2075&la_id=1#whypeng

So, would you agree that if we are going to be strict about who can use the term "Engineer" there shouldn't be a double standard allowing companies to call a position "X Engineer" and then hire someone who isn't a P. Eng for the position?

If Engineer is a restricted term for individuals, then it should be a restricted term for employers as well. Employers having a position with "Engineer" in the title should only be permitted to hire people with a P.Eng.

> Under the Professional Engineers Act, you may only use “engineer” in your job title if you hold a P.Eng. licence.

The company sets the job title. So if they want to hire someone who isn't a P.Eng to the role, that person is supposed to tell the company to change the role title to exclude the term "Engineer" ?