Professional Schools of Engineering

The future education of engineers must include a greater emphasis on professionalism, which has been recognized by many engineering colleges. The topics to be covered, and the extent of the coverage, for professional education are not well defined. A Professional School would involve people from the profession, consider the needs of society, inculcate high ethical practices, and provide continuing education. The technical and professional background would prepare engineers to be leaders in the application of technology. The adequacy of the technical education will be based on accreditation by ECPD. An approach to assure an adequate professional engineering education is through the development and recognition of Professional Schools of Engineering. Considerable discussion has taken place, and continues, on the recognition of such schools. A suggestion currently being pursued is that guidelines be used as a basis of evaluating schools or colleges which seek identification as professional schools or units. The paper presents the tentative guidelines developed by a task force of NSPE for recognizing Professional Schools.