As of March 31, 2017, renewal notices to all engineering licence holders in Ontario will contain a request from Professional Engineers Ontario (PEO) encouraging participation in a new competence assurance program.
As of March 31, 2017, renewal notices to all engineering licence holders in Ontario will contain a request from Professional Engineers Ontario (PEO) encouraging participation in a new competence assurance program.
The Practice Evaluation and Knowledge (PEAK) program contains a practice evaluation questionnaire and an online ethics module that practising licence holders will be asked to complete in their renewal notice. Upon completion of the questionnaire, they will be provided with an individual continuing knowledge target (in hours) to voluntarily complete and report to PEO prior to their next renewal date the following year.
Those who identify as non-practising licence holders will only be asked to declare they are not practising professional engineering and complete the online ethics module prior to the date of their licence renewal.
In Ontario, the public looks to PEO as its primary assurance that engineering licence holders are competent. And it is on the understanding that the association can provide such assurance that the government grants to the profession the privilege of self-regulation.
PEO has a sophisticated process to ensure that applicants have demonstrated high qualifications at the time of their entry into the profession. Up until recently however, it did not have a mechanism in place to measure whether practising licence holders have enhanced, or even maintained, their competence. Further, the public, PEO’s largest and most important stakeholder, had no way to verify if a practising licence holder’s qualifications had been maintained.
The PEAK program is designed to provide PEO with an accurate and up-to-date regulatory profile of its licence holders that will help meet the public’s ever increasing demand for accountability among regulators of professions.
Completion of the PEAK program is not mandatory. However, PEO’s online directory of practitioners will make publicly available the completion status of all elements of the program for each licence holder.
For more information on the PEAK program, consult the PEO website.
