Well put Chris. I agree with you.

When will the so called "authorities" stop inventing the wheel with beliefs created by ignorance? No engineering graduate enters the workplace "work ready". Ever since tertiary trained engineering graduates have started with employers, any industrial environment of note will understand that workplace experience is required together with a good degree of supervision and mentoring before being "workplace ready" in the functions of taking responsibility, and applying the soft skills that are learnt in that process. The SAIMechE Professional Development Programme that supports the training process is carried out in the workplace, and includes for the supervision and the mentoring required to develop the professional competencies which are assessed after a minimum of 3 years experience before the Engineer can be considered for professional assessment. Such a process applies to any discipline eg medicine, law, finance which require a tertiary education as part of the overall requirement.