It's a beautiful tradition. On my graduation all soon-to-be engineer colleagues also made a solemn promise more or less like the ones other engineers take in other countries and schools.

I also like the idea of passing the iron rings down through generations of new engineers. In Brazil we don't. It reminds the ones new to the career that others came before them and that others will come after them and of the obligations we share. That's one thing many of us forget much too frequently.

In Canada, I've heard it's more "traditional" to let the newer engineers wear shinier rings, so the more experienced ones have tarnished rings. One of the older engineers lost his in some machinery and had to get a new one. He hated it, said it made him feel like a n00b :-)

I found it very interesting that joining any of the Australian Professional societies (Engineers Australia, Australian Computer Society) as a Software Engineer we have to agree to a set of bye-laws and a code of ethics with fairly harsh internal penalties.

Personally I think it's a brilliant idea and wish that more professions adopt a similar thinking (I don't know of any that do but then again I haven't looked very hard).