P.E license or Taking more classes?
Submitted by Vdjohan on Fri, 06/06/2008 - 8:05pm.
Hello,
I have been home for the past 7 years mainly to care for my children and other personal reasons. Now I am very eager to go back to work and would like to stay in the technical field. I have a BSEE and 2.5 yrs of Control System Engineer experiences. I would like to get into the design aspects of electrical engineering. Is having a P.E license will better my chances in landing a design job? or should I take some relevant classes? Any feedback will be appreciated.
I'm not an expert in control systems (though I did some internships early on in motion control). When you say a "design job", are you speaking about semiconductors (i.e. essentially changing fields), or design within the control systems arena?
If the former, I would indeed suggest going the classes route versus a P.E. You need to deep dive into that area, and the P.E. will be less useful to chip design companies than up-to-date skills in relevant tools and languages.
There are some fantastic grad classes at UT in this area. I attended UT in the MSEE weekend ("option 3") Circuit Design program, so I can speak first hand.
Sorry about the confusion, I was talking about changing field, not in control system area.
That's a very good point abt diving into the specific area and getting the up-to-date skills. Thanks Matt!
Just FYI, here's that Masters program I attended at UT:
http://lifelong.engr.utexas.edu/degree/cd-overview.cfm
In fact, I see in our calendar that there's an info session coming up:
http://door64.com/node/1756
The classes taught in that curriculum also are taught at night, so these are also a possibility.
@Vdjohan
Have you started actively interviewing, or at least started putting feelers out re: EE design jobs? If so, what is your perception so far?
Matt,
I applied to several jobs but no interviews. That's how I started to think about P.E or take some classes.
I looked at the MSEE program, it seems really good but too costly for me at this moment. Part of the reason why I need a job is to help out my family fianncial needs.
Unfortunately in today's job market more than a couple of months of employment gap can be a difficult obstacle to overcome. I am not sure how necessary or helpful PE licensing is for EEs. I know for Civil Engineers and some others it is practically a requirement to get a job anymore.
If you can't afford to get into an MSEE program (and the problem of adults not being able to afford to go back to school is one I am personally familiar with) then perhaps you could take a few classes, even continuing education types to get back "fresh". The only problem with that is that if you aren't getting interviews, it may be hard to explain to a hiring manager why the classes you are taking make you relevant and up-to-date.
The bad thing is that you may have to take a lower end job than you held previously in order to get back into the market. A lot of people I've known who have had big job gaps have had to start back near entry level and work their way back up. If you haven't already you might want to try opening up your search criteria a little and see if you start to get some interviews.
Anyway, good luck to you and keep us posted how things go.
I was thinking about P.E to perhaps shows the employer that I am serious about getting back to work.
All of the jobs that I had applied to were either entry level or 1-3 yrs experiences and yet, no replied nor interviews.
Thanks for your thoughts and I will surely keep this forum updated.