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Advancing Strategies for Engineering Accreditation in Latin America and the Caribbean

Abstract

Graduating from international recognized (accredited or substantially equivalent) engineering programs is growing in importance as demand for global engineers increases and engineering jobs are being outsourced and are becoming more mobile. This places at a disadvantage engineers that graduate from nations that do not have an internationally recognized engineering program accrediting agency. No Latin American or Caribbean (LAC) nation has signed the Washington, Dublin or Sydney Accords, which grant international mutual recognition of accreditation. Few engineering programs from LAC institutions have sought substantial equivalence. This is to deep concern for the region.

The Latin American and Caribbean Consortium of Engineering Institutions (LACCEI) organized two workshops to advance strategies for increasing the number of accredited engineering programs in the region. The workshops were sponsored by the Organization of American States (OAS), and brought together 40 deans and rectors from the region and societies that have initiatives. These organizations included the Iberoamerican Science and Technology Education Consortium (ISTEC), the Asociación Iberoamericana de Instituciones de Enseñanza de la Ingeniería (ASIBEI – in English: Iberoamerican Association of Engineering Education Institutions) and Engineering for the Americas (EftA).

This paper describes the different declarations, accords, studies and initiatives discussed at the 2007 workshop, strategies that were proposed, and plans for organizations and institutions to collaborate to advance and promote engineering program accreditation in the region.

Introduction

An accredited degree program is defined as one that has attained the approval of an internationally-recognized, national or extra-national quality assurance system that is independent from the system that offers the program and to which the degree granting system has voluntarily submitted the program for review. To facilitate mobility and international recognition of degrees, countries with national accreditation agencies need to sign agreements of mutual recognition. The Washington Accord was signed for that reason in 1989 by the following countries: Australia, Canada, Hong Kong, Ireland, Japan, New Zealand, South Africa, United Kingdom and United States of America, and other countries joined as provisional signatories. Note that no Latin American or Caribbean country has signed the Washington Accord. Likewise, the Dublin and Sydney Accords were signed in 2002 and 2001 for similar mutual recognition of Technology Degrees and again no Latin American or Caribbean country has signed. An engineering program in a country not in these accords that wants to seek international recognition for their degrees, needs to go through a process similar to accreditation with an accrediting agency from another country to seek “substantial equivalence” to an international accredited engineering degree.

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Larrondo Petrie, M. M., & Coto Quintana, G., & Salazar, J., & Velez Munera, J. I. (2008, June), Advancing Strategies For Engineering Accreditation In Latin America And The Caribbean Paper presented at 2008 Annual Conference & Exposition, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. 10.18260/1-2--3339