Teaching vs Engineering profession

[HappyTexan]

Originally Posted by nana053

If an engineer is given substandard materials and parts to work with does anything different happen?




Luckily, I have not had this happen anywhere I have taught nor anywhere where my kids or grandkids have gone to school.

For those that worked with hardware and a quality problem was found it was called "pressing the red button".

It was an adage from the days of the manufacturing line. Any employee could press the red button if they saw a problem. That, in effect, stopped the production line.

As a software engineer, a glaring problem in a design doc written by someone else would be reason to "press the red button" which, in effect, stops development until it can be looked into and corrected.

And yes, I have pressed that red button over my career. For me though it was walking into my manager's office and verbally saying "I'm pressing the red button" as I was a software engineer.

And it's all usually documented. So if mgmt tells you to continue regardless then you are not held responsible.

The GM tale of the faulty ignition switches is a current example as they used the paper trail to trace back the issues logged.

[tnff]

Originally Posted by nana053

If an engineer is given substandard materials and parts to work with does anything different happen?

.

What if you are Allan McDonald or Roger Boisjoly on the morning of 28 January, 1986?

What if your boss does tell you to use substandard material to save costs?

What if you boss tells you to "take another look" at test data that doesn't match political desires?

Scientists and engineers are not shielded from politics. They are right front and center on worldwide TV. When they get the math wrong, billions of dollars are at stake. And people die.

[BostonMike7]

I'm not sure what the point of this thread is? It almost seems like an elitist jab at teachers from those in engineering?


I'm a mechanical engineer and my G/F is a teacher. Never have I ever thought her profession was substandard to mine due to reasons listed in this thread. She works hard, and I see it and it's just funny to see generalizations made about teachers that, unfortunately, I used to believe as well until seeing in person for myself what occurs.

[Ivorytickler]

Originally Posted by BostonMike7

I'm not sure what the point of this thread is? It almost seems like an elitist jab at teachers from those in engineering?


I'm a mechanical engineer and my G/F is a teacher. Never have I ever thought her profession was substandard to mine due to reasons listed in this thread. She works hard, and I see it and it's just funny to see generalizations made about teachers that, unfortunately, I used to believe as well until seeing in person for myself what occurs.

Unfortunately most people haven't seen what teachers really do. They actually believe we're too stupid to get "real" jobs, that we work part time and we're over paid.

I'm a former engineer and what I miss most about being an engineer is the assumptions people made about me. They assumed I was intelligent, that I would get the job done, that I earned my wages and they respected me. I miss the respect more than I miss the wages.