[sclug] (Probably OT): Is BCS membership worth it?

[John Dickson]

On Mon, 7 Jul 2003 02:43:23 +0100 (BST), <lug at assursys.co.uk> wrote:


> <bigoted opinion>
> I keep looking into joining the BCS, with a view to getting CEng status.
>
> But each time I do, I realise that it's quite a lot of money and that the
> BCS seems to be stuck in the past and doesn't really represent its
> rank-and-file members terribly well, IMHO.


Well, regardless of whether it's bigoted or not, your opinion is spot on.

<HEALTH WARNING>
The remainder of this message may cause frothing at the mouth, and other 
unpleasant symptoms like those induced in the author when he was writing 
it.
</HEALTH WARNING>

<RANT>
The whole process of the conversion of the original (amateur, academic, 
unrecognised) group that started the BCS into a full blown Professional 
Institution charging exorbitant fees for irrelevant qualifications, started 
with a con-trick on those of us who were in at the beginning (1968), and 
has continued in the same vein ever since.

In the earlier years of my working life I acquired the following:-

1. Dip.N.A (The Diploma in Naval Architecture of the Royal Naval College 
Greenwich - 1962) This was the highest academic qualification in Naval 
Architecture in the world at that time and enabled me to become.......

2. AMRINA - Associate Member of the Royal Institution of Naval Architects, 
the world wide body for practising professionals in the industry.  This was 
considered to be essential for reasons of status and career progress.

When I left the world of Naval Architecture and joined the nascent computer 
industry I assumed that there would be a similar system, so I acquired the 
following:

3. M.Sc. (Computer Science - London University 1970).  Of no value whatever 
except to acquire the letters after my name.  The intellectual standard was 
low and the content was way behind the leading edge work that everyone in 
the Computing Industry was involved in.

4. AMBCS.  I joined as an Associate Member before there were any entrance 
requirements (just give us the money!). I then refused to pay any more fees 
in protest at the con-trick which was perpetrated on us all to set up the 
formal examination route to membership.

5. MBCS. When, much later, the BCS were desperate to register as many 
people as possible as C.Eng in order to become full members of the 
Engineering Council, I renewed my lapsed membership just long enough to get 
their admin system to upgrade me to full membership and process my 
application to become........

6. C.Eng.  I used the BCS route and my freshly minted MBCS to acquire the 
status of C.Eng based on my previous qualification as a Naval Architect and 
membership of the RINA!

In effect the BCS tacitly admitted that, as a professional qualification, 
my MBCS wasn't worth the paper it was printed on (which I knew already).  
However, I was fooled by the very aggressive propaganda to persuade people 
to become C.Eng.  We were told that because of attitudes in Europe, and 
particularly in Germany, we would not be able to work at a senior level in 
Europe without this sort of qualification.  While this might have been true 
for anyone wanting to take up residence, and employment, in some other 
European country, it was utterly irrelevant for all the thousands of 
programmers who worked abroad as contractors on large scale projects.

So what was it worth?  Well, since they cost me very little to acquire, 
perhaps being able to put M.Sc. MBCS, C.Eng after my name might have proved 
to be value for money in getting work.  Far from it. In the early and 
middle 1990's there was an increasing (and highly justified) backlash in 
the industry against Computer Science graduates who had been taught 
"everything you need to know about Pascal and Djikstra's Shunting 
Algorithm" but who didn't know one end of a financial system from the 
other.  I soon learned to very careful about what I put on my CV.

Later on the BCS rose to stardom by proposing something called the 
"European Computer Driving License". They persuaded the New Labour 
government to fund them to set and mark exams for it. Guess what! The bulk 
of the syllabus consisted of how to use Microsoft Office.  Do you want your 
technical competence and standing to measured by such an organisation?

As for representing the rank-and-file and supporting them in their 
professional development (which any half-way decent professional body is 
very concerned about) the fact that the BCS has not apparently been 
accorded Institutional status says it all. In fact, the history is even 
worse. I don't know what the situation is now but in the 1980's and earlier 
all members were assigned to a "local" branch based on geography.  The 
result was that Thames Valley Branch, based on Reading, acquired thousands 
of members (17,000 comes to mind but I can't be sure) who had only joined 
to get the letters after their name. I responded to a circular complaining 
that only 3 men and a dog turned up to the branch meetings, and suggested 
that the branch should address the real concerns of the members in getting 
work. Voila, I was appointed as a branch representative to a national 
conference of the BCS to discuss the "Way Ahead". A large majority of the 
rank and file put this same point very forcefully at the conference.  The 
response of the 'great and good' was to set up a series of working parties 
(chaired and manned by themselves, of course) to discuss all their pet 
topics (like matrix inversion on clusters of ZX80's). I, and others 
submitted working papers about professional development to these groups but 
received no response.  In fact nobody even had the courtesy to acknowledge 
receipt.

</RANT>


Well you were warned!


-- 
********************************************************************************

John Dickson  johnd at cavcomp.co.uk

Caversham Computer Services Ltd
1A Kidmore Road
Caversham
Reading
RG4 7LR

Tel: +44 (0)118 954 3166  Fax: +44 (0)118 954 3199
http://www.cavcomp.co.uk/

The views of John Dickson and the views of CCS  may diverge violently but 
I'll always maintain both of them to the bitter end.