Remember me

Register

 | Home  | Contact us

Information aplenty

Useful information to help add value to an apprenticeship.

Are international qualifications recognised?
Examples of some companies apprenticeship schemes
Gaining the EngTech (source: scenta.co.uk)
How to become an electrician
Industry pay rates
Case studies from apprentices and technicians
How a professional organisation can add value to your apprenticeship
Apprenticeships
Advice on part time or distance learning

Are international qualifications recognised?

The ECUK who hold the register of professional engineers, has entered into three agreements with overseas engineering organisations which provide for mutual recognition of accredited academic programmes.

The three agreements operate at the globally recognised three levels of registration: Washington Accord (Chartered /Professional Engineer), Sydney Accord (Incorporated Engineer/Engineering Technologist) and Dublin Accord (Engineering Technician).

The Dublin Accord, which will recognise the qualifications which underpin the granting of Engineering Technician titles, is currently recognised by the following four countries, through the signatory engineering organisations:

  • Canada
  • South Africa
  • Ireland
  • United Kingdom

Examples of some companies apprenticeship schemes…

The following ETB corporate members offer apprenticeship schemes - details about each scheme can be accessed through the external links in the right hand menu.

Airbus UK
Astra Zeneca
BAE Systems
British Telecom
Centrica
Ford
National Grid
Network Rail

Back to the top

Gaining EngTech (source: scenta)

Engineering Technician (EngTech) is one of three professional qualifications (CEng; IEng; EngTech) for engineers registered with the Engineering Council UK (ECUK). Registration is essential to proving yourself as an engineer and making sure that you continue to get better, and progress, at your job. 

Professional Engineering Technicians apply proven techniques and procedures to the solution of practical engineering problems. They carry supervisory or technical responsibility and contribute to the design, development, manufacture, commissioning, operation or maintenance of products, equipment, processes or services. Professional Engineering Technicians are required to apply safe systems of work. All professional engineers must demonstrate a personal and professional commitment to society, to their profession, and to the environment. See the EngTech website for further details.

What is a professional engineer?

The UK's best engineers and technicians are registered by the Engineering Council UK [ECUK] as Chartered or Incorporated Engineers or as Engineering Technicians.

Why Register?

Personal development: part of your CV development and opportunities to widen career choices.

Personal achievement: satisfaction of achieving an independent, well established, internationally recognised

Client confidence: knowing you can assure consistent service.

Employer assurance: demonstrated competence to contribute professionally to the business.

How to go about it

The UK Standard for Professional Engineering Competence: Engineering Technician standard (336KB) lists the generic abilities that have to be achieved for Engineering Technician registration. It also gives examples of typical ways of doing this, and explains the steps necessary to achieve national registration. Candidates who believe they measure up to these, or who wish to work towards them, should approach one of the listed engineering institutions to obtain further details of how to apply for recognition and registration. The EC(UK) has a list of institutions, with web links. 

Type of qualifications/experience needed?

Registration as a professional Engineering Technician is open to everyone who can demonstrate an ability to perform professional engineering work to the necessary standards, and commitment to:

  • Maintain that competence
  • Work within professional codes
  • Participate actively within the profession

In order to gain the competences necessary for registration, a period of training and experience will have been undertaken. Formal, supervised training such as is provided by some engineering-based advanced modern apprenticeships can provide most, or all, of the training and experience necessary. Indeed some advanced modern apprenticeships will lead directly to professional Engineering Technician registration. View the EngTech leaflet. There is no requirement for ‘time-serving’. Some institutions will be able to provide a mentor to help candidates. 

Route A

Candidates who hold particular types of qualifications, will usually find that this greatly simplifies the process of becoming an Engineering Technician. Typical qualifications are:

  • National Certificate or National Diploma in Engineering or Construction & the Built Environment
  • An approved qualification in engineering or construction at level 6 in the Scottish Qualifications and Credit Framework
  • The City & Guilds Higher Professional Diploma in Engineering
  • A technical certificate as part of an approved Advanced Modern Apprenticeship Programme
  • An approved level 3 NVQ or SVQ
  • A work-based learning route approved by a licensed professional engineering institution
  • Qualifications in similar areas providing they are assessed as equivalent by a licensed professional engineering institution.

Route B

Candidates without the qualifications listed above may be able to apply for a Route B Appraisal. This separate procedure, administered by the applicant’s institution, involves an in-depth appraisal of the knowledge and experience acquired. Experienced, practising professional Engineering Technicians are often found to have gained the necessary knowledge and skills for their job through working closely with other skilled colleagues over a number of years.

Professional Development

Many potential professional Engineering Technicians will not have had the advantage of formal training, and will need to demonstrate they have acquired the necessary competences through extended experience, some of this supervised. In some cases employers will make use of occupational standards in determining job descriptions and for general staff development.  Evidence of employer recognition of competences and relevant skills will assist in achieving registration.

Opportunities for progression?

Engineering Technicians (EngTech) may, as their careers develop, wish to work towards Incorporated Engineer (IEng) and Chartered Engineer (CEng) status. Registration as EngTech links a professional engineer into a professional engineering institution, which provide advice and support for progression as well as other comprehensive professional development guidance and opportunities, with regular publications and web access to assist in this, and many opportunities to network with colleagues with similar professional interests.

Back to the top

How to become an electrician

Speak to the specific institution if you want specifics, otherwise refer to routes in the sections above and 'Advice and guidance on becoming an electrician' article.

Back to the top

Industry pay rates

No doubt this is the section many readers will turn to first. The question on most people's minds when contemplating a career is, ‘What will I earn?’ Well, you've come to the right place for the right information. 

Some of the latest figures which you can read in more detail below suggest that engineering graduates are likely to be earning up to £3,000 more than their peers not long after graduation. They are also more likely to find employment after graduation and in their preferred area of work in comparison to other graduates.

What am I likely to earn as a graduate engineer?

What are the immediate prospects for a graduate engineer, the answer is good. Their starting salaries tend to be above average (around £18,000 in 2002) with engineers and computer scientists earning 29% and 14% respectively above the typical graduate salary of £14,000. Top-earning engineers’ salaries were comparable with top salaries for all graduates, suggesting that the overall higher-than-average earnings were not caused by a small number of exceptionally well-paid people. In fact, the variation seemed to be near the bottom end of the pay range, where engineers and electrical engineers were paid 25 –40% more than average. 51% of engineers earned a high salary, being defined as £18,000 or more, compared to 21% of the whole sample of graduates.

And while junior salaries increased from a median of £13,750 in 1999 to £20,200 in 2002, an increase of 45%, early pay scales for Chemical Engineering and Civil Engineering were £25,637 and £22,167 per annum respectively, according to the Remuneration Economics survey:

  • Chemical £25,637
  • Civil £22,167
  • Electrical £21,913
  • Mechanical £21,049
  • Hi-tech £20,304
  • Production £19,959

What am I likely to earn as a mid-level engineer?

New income and earnings data from the 2003 Survey of Registered Engineers, published by the Engineering and Technology Board, demonstrates that earnings of professional engineers continue to increase at a rate well above inflation and reinforce engineering's position as a well-rewarded and secure profession, ‘engineers' pay and prospects are in the premier league’.

The average earnings of Chartered Engineers are now £49,088 compared with £40,131 in 1997 – an increase of 22.3%. Incorporated Engineers have seen the highest increase in average earnings, up from an average in 1997 of £29,918 to £37,845 in 2003, an increase of 26.5%. Engineering Technicians have seen an increase in average earnings, from £26,311 in 1997 to £32,993 in 2003 – a rise of 25.4%. During the same six-year period the retail price index has increased by 15.9%, but average earnings for the whole economy rose by 27.9%. New Earnings Survey data published in 2003 for the year ending April 2002 gave annual average gross earnings of £36,176 for chartered, and certified, accountants, £53,982 for health professionals and £45,580 for solicitors. All this is further evidence that engineers' pay and prospects are in the premier league among the professions, that is, accountants, lawyers and health professionals – essential conditions if industry and business are to continue to recruit the most talented young people and the UK is to avoid skills shortages that could damage the economy.

The sky is the limit?

Nor does the pay rise limit itself. As a high-flying Chartered Engineer you could earn well over £70,000 per annum; in 2003, 13% of Chartered Engineers earned over £70,000.

This is backed up by the Institute of Chemical Engineers' salary survey, which reveals that chemical engineering salaries were second only to those of doctors and solicitors. The salaries for senior managers are generally about £50,000 across the sectors, with the highest earners being those in contracting (£67,250) and oil (£77,000). Most managing directors or chief executives earned median salaries in the £60,000-£80,000 range, with six-figure salaries going to those in chemicals and allied products (£106,750) and power (£151,000).

There is, however, a quite widespread belief that engineers cannot break through the ‘glass ceiling’ into the boardroom and get to the top. This could not be further from the truth, according to the recent ETB research in January 2004, of the one hundred FTSE 100 top executives, 12 proved to hold engineering qualifications, 12 were scientists, and 20 had accounting qualifications. Nor are the salaries within this sector low, according to the Labour Research Dept, 'Executive Excess', published in 2002 the top engineering CEOs earned anything up to and exceeding £3million per annum.

Key facts:

Graduate

The average starting salary of all graduates in 2002 was £14,000. This was a decrease of 7% from the previous year and was a result of the increase in short term employment and a decrease in graduate vacancies.

Engineering graduates earned an average of £18,000 – well over the median starting salaries of all graduates at the end of 2002.

Economic trends

The average earnings of Chartered Engineers are now £49,088 compared with £40,131 in 1997 – an increase of 22.3%.

Incorporated Engineers earnings, rose from £29,918 in 1997 to £37,845 in 2003, an increase of 26.5%.

Women in SET

Females continue to be underrepresented in the engineering profession; 74% of those obtaining a first degree in a SET subject entering employment in the industrial sector classified as health and social work.

Only 34.9% and 14.6% of female SET graduate entered the more ‘traditionally’ male sectors of Manufacturing and Construction, though this is changing.

Back to the top

Case studies from apprentices and technicians

You might want to check out scenta role models

How a professional organisation can add value to your apprenticeship

See about EngTech above, Q3.

Back to the top

Apprenticeships

See SEMTA (Science, Engineering, ManufacturingTechnologies Alliances) is the sector skills council for science, engineering and manufacturing technologies.

Apprenticeship programmes will offer you the chance to learn your chosen career path on-the-job, ensuring you achieve your potential by gaining recognised qualifications and relevant workplace skills in company, and what’s more, you’ll receive a wage, which will increase as you progress.

Your success will depend on your commitment and dedication to the programme.

Apprenticeship programmes offered by SEMTA:

Engineering Apprenticeship programmes

  • Young Apprenticeship in Engineering
  • Apprenticeship in Industrial Applications
  • Apprenticeship in Engineering
  • Advanced Apprenticeship in Engineering
  • Adult Apprenticeship in Engineering
  • Higher Apprenticeship in Engineering
  • Graduate Apprenticeship in Engineering
  • Foundation Degree Apprenticeship in Engineering

Science Apprenticeship programmes

  • Apprenticeship for Optical Manufacturing Technicians
  • Apprenticeship for Optical Assistants and Practice Support Staff
  • The Generic Apprenticeship for Laboratory Technicians
  • Advanced Apprenticeship for Optical Manufacturing Technicians
  • Advanced Apprenticeship for Optical Assistants and Practice Support Staff
  • The Generic Advanced Apprenticeship for Laboratory Technicians

Information regarding each apprenticeship is currently being updated for the SEMTA website. As soon as it becomes available the above list will become active links to the relevant information. In the meantime please visit SEMTA website.

Advice on part time or distance learning

Aim Higher is a national programme run by the Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE) with support from the Department for Education and Skills (DfES).

Back to the top