The Chamber of Engineers has protested after a bridging course meant to bring Mcast engineering graduates on par with those at University was halved, in breach of an agreement reached with the Engineering Board.

The chamber said it met the board on March 25 to address deficiencies of the past Mcast graduate courses and to ensure that the new courses were in line with the standard that needs to be attained.

It was agreed that graduates should bridge any deficiencies through targeted bridging studies at level 6 with examination-based assessment. These bridging studies would be reviewed by external reviewers.

It was also agreed that new Mcast courses should have the same number of credits as the university course based mostly on examination assessment as well as being reviewed annually by external reviewers.

READ: Mcast is still restructuring engineering courses - Chamber of Engineers

But late last month the Chamber received a notice from the Engineering Board that the bridging studies would actually be of 30 credits rather than the 60 credits which were agreed. 

The past Mcast courses were based on 120 credits at level 5 and 120 credits at level 6 while the course from the University of Malta is a 240 credits course at level 6, the chamber observed.

"At the moment, the law requires that only equivalent courses to the University of Malta can lead to the attainment of the warrant," the chamber said.

Having Mcast engineering graduates with lower standards was unjust to current and past students of the B.Eng. (Hons.) course at the University of Malta, new Mcast students who will be taking a full course of 240 credits at level 6 and all current warrant holders who have gone through the University of Malta B.Eng.(Hons.) course.

The Chamber said it would consider various options at its disposal to tackle this issue and will call a meeting for all engineers, graduate engineers and engineering students.

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