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PE Waive for PHD 11

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lycosbpl

Civil/Environmental
Apr 25, 2010
1
Hi,
I have 4 years of Experience as of now and passed EIT in California.
I did my PHD from Texas. How can i waive my PE in Texas.
 
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You cannot waive a PE examination based on education. Similarly a PE with many years of experience cannot waive a PhD admission exam.

Both exams have thier place since having a PE no more makes an engineer ready for the pursuit of advanced degree than does a PhD make up for years of practical experience.

I speak from experience on boths sides and have a SE to boot.

Regards,
Qshake
[pipe]
Eng-Tips Forums:Real Solutions for Real Problems Really Quick.
 
If your doing "Civil/Environmental" work in Texas - odds are you'll work under an industry exemption in which case a PE is irrelevant. Particularly at the PhD level and in this economy - there is no public sector work. Industry doesn't care about the P.E.

Go work for a big company, stay away from consulting - and don't waste your time.

my $0.02
 
I tend to disagree with Roy - my PE license(s) have been a tremendous boon to my professional career. Just having the PE has carried a lot of weight even when I wasn't specifically licensed in a particular state. Go for it... Rather inexpensive and if you don't need it - just put it in the drawer UNTIL the day you do!!
 
I do agree that you should go for your PE. I think all engineers should get their PE. I'm still on the road on getting mine. I work in industry, may never use it, but once I get the licensens it will sure look good on my resume.

Tobalcane
"If you avoid failure, you also avoid success."
 
It is my undertanding that there is a proposal by the US PE test and qualifying orgaization to REQUIRE a masters degree in engineering prior to applying for a PE, scheduled to be required in 2020.
 
"...stay away from consulting... "

That's one of the few things a PhD is really good for. For design/production work, a PE is more valuable to most companies, at least in my experience.

One of my sons is just graduating in Chem E, he did not sit for the EIT over my objections. All the academics recommended against it, said it was "unnecessary and does not make you a better engineer". Naturally their recommendations were to stay in school for an masters and/or PhD. I am fit to be tied.
 
Maybe if more engineering were taught at the batchelor level, a masters wouldn't be required. Just a thought.

- Steve
 
Sompting, how dare you. All that 'history of Rock & Roll' and 'Basket Weaving' are essential for rounding out students here in the land of the free.

We don't want any of that British starting to specialize at 16 (or maybe even 14) nonsense.

Posting guidelines faq731-376 (probably not aimed specifically at you)
What is Engineering anyway: faq1088-1484
 
Well said, Qshake. Having a PhD is no qualification for being a PE. I've known many clueless PhD's and many clueless PE's. In my opinion, having a PhD usually means knowing a lot about one subject. For some engineers, having a PE means they think they know everything about everything.

All engineering professors should have a P.E. license. Having a PhD is good for a professor but, to me, a professor with a PE license has demonstrated a more well rounded engineering background which should be more beneficial to students. When I was in college, the best professors all had real-world industry experience and professional licenses.

If a PhD wants to be a PE, let him or her meet the same requirements as the rest of us did. No free passes for PhD's.

 
In Washington, to take the PE, you have to have eight years experience. A BS degree from a four year university counts for four years of that, a Masters an additional year, and a PhD, one more, for a total of 6 of the 8. So, you still have to work under the supervision of a licensed PE in your field two more years before you could be considered eligible to take just the PE exam, let alone the structural, which takes an additional two years of experience.

It's a long road to hoe - not one just to be swept away.

Mike McCann
MMC Engineering
Motto: KISS
Motivation: Don't ask
 
@Roy: Huh? If ever there was a field most likely to require licensure, civil is it.

Regarding engineering education (a whole nother discussion, really)...I don't know that the "good old days" were ever all that good either. My first undergrad program, before I got there, used to be a five-year program that got condensed down to four. What is a five-year undergraduate program but a 4-year BS plus one-year MS without actually having an MS to show for it?

Perhaps the nature of the non-engineering classes needs to be tweaked, but there is a lot to be said for having classes in history, political science, economics, psychology/sociology/anthropology/other social science, writing, public speaking. If I think back to what I was forced to take against my will, the only one I have seen zero benefit from over the years was literature. Of the rest, most comes up a bit here and there one way or the other in professional context, and the rest makes me a better-functioning and better-prepared human being in my society.

Hg

Eng-Tips policies: faq731-376
 
At the PhD level - in Texas - there are more opportunities within exempt industries (see: oil and gas, R&D) than anywhere else. That's what i've seen anyway.
 
Two comments:

1) what is your motivation for seeking exemption from an industry standard? The very reason for professional licensure, protecting life and property, is not consistent with short cuts.

2) If you really want to bypass the PE, become licensed in Canada where there exists no PE or FE test, and then become licensed by comity with the State of Texas. That does not work in most States, but the Association of professional Engineers and Geoscientists of Alberta claims this is possible for the State of Texas.
 
i agree there's no national PE exam, but i think each province has it's own. in my experience Canada (ie Ontario) is very parochial about their university standards (Canadian good, a very limited selection of the rest-of-the-world ok, everybody else no good). In lieu of doing Canadian exams (did my uni in Oz) i got grandfathered by a board who didn't understand the technical work i was doing. Now I have a licence and my company (ie me) needs a licence (CofA) to offer my services.
 
Is the PE wave the one with the middle finger extended? I saw that a couple times yesterday.
 
Yes, the third leg comes in handy for that too [pipe]

[peace]
Fe
 
I've noticed that the definition of "engineering" differs from state to state... I have a PhD in ME (with a specialty in Mech of Materials) and am sitting for the Mech Eng PE license this October.

My issue is that the tangent field I'm jumping into is carbon footprint/energy analysis. The people who are currently consulting in this area (chem science and environmental types) don't appear to be required to get a PE to practice this. It does bother/concern me a little that non-ME's are barging into the "energy" world through this backdoor.

Also, the global nature of engineering means that companies can go outside the US for their analysis/design work. While we here have to trudge through the paperwork of state-by-state comity. Anyone seen Elance? No PE required there. I'm just wondering what the real value of a PE is in our global economy. It seems to mostly slow us down here.
 
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