ABET accreditation, how important is it?

<p>I plan on graduating from a school that does not have ABET accreditation (CivE.) I was just pondering how important this is in career. Is it true that most employers do not hire unless you graduate a school that is ABET accredited?
How can ABET determine an individuals ability to practice what (s)he has studied?Isn't that what PE exams are for?
What are the majors Ups/Downs of graduating with/without ABET accreditation?</p>

<p>if you plan on taking the PE to become a licensed professional engineer (as many CivE's do), you need to go to an ABET accredited school. If you don't, it's going to be a massive pain in the ass.</p>

<p>ABET does not determine an individuals ability to practice what he has studied. Instead, It determines the school's qualifications and ability to teach the necessary fundamentals and coursework that a future engineer will need.</p>

<p><a href="http://www.nspe.org/govrel/gr2-ps1737.asp%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.nspe.org/govrel/gr2-ps1737.asp&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>ABET is the most important for civil engineering. For anything else, you can get away with it, but civil is the one engineering where you do really need an ABET accredited school. What school is it btw?</p>

<p>The practice of civil engineering is tightly regulated by state governments. Civil engineers are normally expected to hold state-issued "Professional Engineer" (PE) licenses, just as lawyers are expected to pass the Bar and accountants are expected to be CPAs. </p>

<p>All state licensing boards prefer ABET BS degrees, and some states strictly require them. For civil engineers, a non-ABET BS degree is a significant handicap. In some states, you simply cannot qualify for a PE license without an ABET BS degree. In others, you can still qualify for a PE license, but you will be required to earn an acceptable MS degree, or gain many extra years of acceptable work experience. </p>

<p>If you plan to practice civil engineering without an ABET degree, you need to check your state licensing laws to determine how serious the handicap will be. Employers, as well as state licensing boards, will view this negatively.</p>

<p>It would be very, very unusual for a US school to offer a civil engineering degree without ABET accreditation. Are you sure that your school is unaccredited? What school is it?</p>

<p>City College of new york.
I can not find any CUNY (city university of new york) or SUNY (state university of new york) school on their website. seems ackward.</p>

<p>UPDATE: SORRY GUYS IT IS COMING UP NOW. IT WAS NOT COMING UP EARLIER. I APOLOGIZE.</p>

<p>According to ABET, the Civil Engineering program of CUNY-City College has been accredited since 1936. That's the year that ABET first started accrediting engineering programs, so City College's program is as old as an ABET-accredited program can be.</p>

<p>almost every college with engineering program is ABET accredited</p>

<p>not ITT TECH.</p>

<p>ITT Tech isn't engineering though, it's engineering technology.</p>

<p>
[quote]
almost every college with engineering program is ABET accredited

[/quote]
This is true for major engineering disciplines subject to state licensing laws, such as civil, electrical, mechanical, or chemical. The schools know that at least some of their graduates (or most, in the case of civil) will pursue licensure, and will need accredited degrees. It would be very unusual for a school to lack ABET accreditation in disciplines like these.</p>

<p>On the other hand, ABET accreditation may be perceived as optional in engineering disciplines where state licensure is unimportant or nonexistent. For example, biomedical engineering is essentially unregulated, and so many top schools have never bothered to get ABET accreditation for their BME programs. ABET also accredits computer science programs, but many top CS schools are unaccredited, for the same reason.</p>

<p>There are only 340+ Abet accredited engineering schools in the US, there are alot more schools that teach engineering</p>

<p>Stiuck with abet.</p>

<p>I just realized Biomedical Engineering at City isn't ABET accredited. Is that okay or not? Eks!</p>

<p>Accreditation is basically irrelevant for BioMedE, as none of the states actually certifies such engineers. </p>

<p>The only engineering disciplines where accreditation really matters is CivE/Structural E. It has minor significance for ME's, EE's, and ChemE's, and is of negligible importance for all other engineers.</p>

<p>The school where I'm an adjunct professor makes a big deal about ABET accreditation and I was interviewed etc. I think it is totally meaningless.</p>

<p>ABET does not accredit schools, only programs within schools.</p>