Here is an attempt to persuade the NCEES to move more strongly in favor of SI.
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Tim,
I am pleased to learn that the PE Mechanical exam will add the SI option in the
fall of 2008, but I'm disappointed to see in the table of "Exam Formats" that
*all* of the exams do not yet offer an SI option after nearly thirty years
since the NCEE initiative of 1980 to add SI to the FE exam.
For example, highest accuracy surveying and less accurate GPS positioning are
based on the meter, not on the foot. A surveyor tells me that at least two
adjacent states use the survey foot in one state and the statute foot in the
other state. And yet the PS exam still does not offer an SI option! Why not?
Apparently, each exam committee can do as it pleases with respect to units of
measurement.
The cycle "Teach What is Practiced" and "Practice What is Taught" is self
perpetuating. It does not move a discipline from the 19th to the 21st century
in harmony with units of measurement used throughout the rest of the world.
Consider a faculty or college of engineering that emphasizes SI to enable its
graduates to practice globally. These graduates and others who know SI have
little respect for
activities which require non-SI unit of measurement.
Although I have no authority to compose and articulate NCEES policy, I would
like to propose that the NCEES require each committee to draft *all* exams in
an SI-only version; or in two separate and distinct versions, one SI and the
other non-SI, with no mixing of the two versions, so that an examinee has a
clear choice for SI.
Please submit this proposal to the Exam governing bodies.
Thanks.
Eugene A. Mechtly
---- Original message ----
>Date: Wed, 2 Apr 2008 08:41:21 -0400
>From: "Tim Miller" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>Subject: SI in NCEES Examinations
>To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>Cc: "Jerry Carter" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>
> Eugene,
> Here's a link to our website that shows the format
> of each exam along with the units.
> http://www.ncees.org/exams/formats/
> Of the 20 exams that we offer, 14 use both SI and
> USCS units. When I say both, that doesn't mean that
> every problem has both types of units and the
> examinees can choose to work the same problem in
> either units. That was tried on the FE exam for a
> while but it caused confusion among the examinees
> and the logistics were difficult, so it was phased
> out.
> At this point, exams that use both units of
> measurement have some problems in USCS and other
> problems in SI. Most of our committees that have
> both units of measurement use the philosophy of
> however the subject area is taught or used in
> practice dictates which units are used.
> Also, the Mechanical PE exam will be moving from
> just using USCS units to both USCS and SI starting
> with the fall, 2008 exam. But here is another
> example where machine design will be using more SI
> than USCS because that's what is used in practice,
> but HVAC will using only USCS for the same reason.
...
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