Motivation
The IMechE has seven international regions, namely; Southern Asia Region (SAR), South-East Asia Region (SEAR), North-East Asia Region (NEAR), Oceania, Europe, Americas, Middle-East and Africa. Asia-Oceania is a subset of four of these international regions.
There is an aspiration to achieve a worldwide IMechE membership of 150,000 and it is acknowledged that most of this growth will come from the International regions and young members. Southern Asia Region has seen rapid growth in the last few years with over 2.5% of the world membership. Therefore, the Southern Asia Region has foreseen a need to increase and inspire our young generation of engineers to carry the institution forward in the coming years.
One of the biggest membership challenges that the Institution faces is the conversion of Affiliates to Associates. This is largely because the value proposition for our international affiliates is unappreciated and limited. The primary focus of this event is to inspire the attendees to address the issues surrounding Affiliate to Associate conversion in the Asia Oceania Region.
In Asia Pacific region, professional registration is not widely recognised by industry and young members do not gain much in local job interviews by being an IMechE member. This is a major reason for them dropping out from the institution’s membership once they have graduated. Therefore, in regions like Southern Asia, there is an increased need for IMechE to support our younger membership ensuring that they benefit from membership and thus retain their membership.
About Engineering Tomorrow
In light of the above, the IMechE Southern Asia Region would be hosting “Engineering Tomorrow”: an Asia-Oceania event for the young members of the constituting regions, which will be combined with the Asia Pacific Speak out for Engineering (SOFE) finals to be held in Colombo, Sri Lanka. The participating nations are China, Hong Kong, Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, Australia, New Zealand, Pakistan, India, UK and Sri Lanka.
The event is also supported by the UK Young Member Board. The event will be held from 7-8th November 2014.
Event Schedule
The event will be held over two days and will cover the following:
- Speak Out for Engineering
- Annual Dinner
- Young Member Conference
- Learned Society talks
IMechE Sri Lanka Group has invited all overseas attendees to their Annual Dinner.
- 7th Nov 2014: Asia-Oceania SOFE Finals
- 7th Nov 2014: Sri Lanka Group Annual Dinner
- 8th Nov 2014: Seminars and Talks
- 8th Nov 2014: Young Member conference
Young Member Conference
The engineering community and thinkers around the world has acknowledged the fact that the society will be taken forward by our young engineers, thinkers and entrepreneurs. It is paramount responsibility of the established and experienced engineers to guide the young generation towards releasing their potential and engage them more proactively.
The young member conference will encourage student members of IMechE from Sri Lanka and young members for the Asia Oceania region to have an interaction and to share their expectations about what the IMechE should offer. The conference will focus on creating a pilot scheme to increase young member activities internationally.
The basic aim of the young member conference is to encourage students to pursue an engineering career and improve the world through engineering. Based on the outcome of the conference, it might be interesting to replicate such a conference in Europe, the Middle East and Americas.
Learned Society
A series of technical seminars and panel discussions will be held with international speakers sharing their insights on engineering. The learned society talks will expose our young members in Sri Lanka with the realms of possibilities that engineering has to offer. Possible subjects include (subject to confirmation of individual speakers):
- Engineering in Society: How is engineering changing the developing world?
- Inspiring the next generation: What IMechE means to young engineers?
- 3D printing and its implication for the developing world
- Graphene, the Wonder Material
- A new challenge for IMechE toward Aviation industry
- Panel Discussion: Diversification of Mechanical Engineering: From machines to music
The talks will be video recorded and will go into the IMechE database, which can be viewed by all members worldwide.
The event details can be found on our NearYou website events page.
For more details please contact:
Sam Perera: SouthernAsiaChair@imechenetwork.org
Siddartha Khastgir: SouthernAsiaAdmin@imechenetwork.org