KARACHI, July 14: Representatives of eight public and private sector engineering universities and colleges gave detailed presentations about engineering courses and disciplines offered by their institutions, admission criteria and scope of engineering fields at a seminar titled “Which Engineering Discipline Should I Chose”, here on Sunday.

The seminar was organized by the Institution of Engineers Pakistan (IEP), Karachi centre, to create awareness among the students of intermediate pre-engineering group, about various engineering disciplines offered by Pakistani engineering institutes and their demand in the local as well as international market.

President IEP M.P. Gangwani said allocation of seats in engineering universities and colleges in Pakistan was based on the number of faculty available in some particular discipline, which should otherwise be based on market demands.

“Our system of engineering education needs drastic changes if we have to move hand-in-hand with the internationally community,” he said, adding that the majority of local engineering universities, engineers and students were ill-informed about the hurdles, which will be created after the implementation of GATS and WTO regulations in 2005.

Stressing the need for imparting engineering education to the students in accordance with international standards, he said Pakistani universities and colleges would have to modify their curricula and get their universities accredited with the Washington Accord to save their graduates from disadvantages of non-accredited engineers.

He said the IEP was striving hard to improve professional standards of engineers through various programmes, including Initial Professional Development (IPD) and Continued Professional Development (CPD), to ensure a dignified and respectable position for them among the community of engineers.

He praised the efforts of IEP Karachi centre for organizing the seminar to apprise the youths of the prospects and challenges ahead.

Earlier, in his welcome address, chairman IEP Karachi centre Khalid Qureshi said the seminar had been arranged to help the pre-engineering students to choose their future field and subjects.

Over 150 students, studying in various colleges in pre-engineering group attended the seminar.

Representatives of the NED University, Sir Syed University of Engineering and Technology, Dawood College of Engineering and Technology, Usman Institute of Engineering and Technology, PAF-Karachi Institute of Economics and Technology, Institute of Industrial Electronics Engineering, Pakistan Naval College of Engineering and Hamdard University of Information Technology participated in the seminar.—PPI