It is a very different set of trade offs than what we have in CS, where companies are more than willing to take a chance on bright people with non traditional backgrounds, including people that never went to college or dropped out. As a lifelong self-learner, I’ve certainly appreciated the lack of “credentialism” at tech companies.

The one part of the PE thing that I would like to see borrowed is the exams. If all companies are just running everyone through the same kinds of general CS problems anyway, might as well save everyone time and improve consistency by making a standardized test.