NCEES Verified for Education: A Comprehensive Overview

To earn a license to practice engineering or surveying, candidates must meet requirements in three areas: education, experience, and examinations. State licensing boards sometimes require that a candidate’s educational background be evaluated to ensure that it is comparable to an accredited degree in the United States. This article provides a detailed overview of the NCEES Verified for Education program, a service designed to assist state licensing boards and applicants in this process.

Understanding NCEES Credentials Evaluations

NCEES Credentials Evaluations is a service for state licensing boards and applicants. It is designed primarily for candidates who have earned their degrees outside the United States and are pursuing licensure through one of the member licensing boards of NCEES. NCEES credential evaluation services serves as an advisor to the state boards. In other words, the reports that they generate help to fill in the missing information about an applicant’s educational background. This standard reflects generally agreed-upon educational qualifications for entering the profession. If your college-level coursework meets the standard, your evaluation report will indicate this.

Important Disclaimer: NCEES is not involved in granting licenses or clearing applicants for taking the exam.

Purpose of an Evaluation

The evaluation process helps ensure that a candidate is qualified academically for licensure. Usually, this takes place when a candidate applies to sit for a licensing exam offered by NCEES. The State boards are looking for licensees to have an ABET accredited degree or one that is equivalent to an ABET accredited program.

Do You Need an Evaluation?

If you aren’t sure whether you need a credentials evaluation through NCEES, contact your state licensing board before you begin the process. You do not need an evaluation if your degree was accredited by the Engineering Accreditation Commission (EAC) of ABET at the time of your graduation. ABET also accredits some programs in other countries, click here for a list of foreign entities.

The Evaluation Process

The credential evaluation is a course-by-course evaluation of your college coursework.

Application Submission: To start, log in to your MyNCEES account and select Multistate Licensure from your dashboard. The application is divided into five sections and can be completed in any order. It is an online application process and provides for electronic verifications.
Document Request: Once the application is received by NCEES, the evaluator will send you a message letting you know what documents are needed for the evaluation. Once your evaluator contacts you, you will have access to a transcript request form that you can send off to your institution and lets your institution know what exactly is required and what they must send back to NCEES. All applicants must provide the following from all universities attended and for all college-level coursework and degrees earned. If official documents cannot be provided in English, a translation from a certified translation company is required. The university should send the native language course descriptions to you so you can send them to a certified translator. NCEES does not keep native language course descriptions. You may send your course descriptions, catalogs, and/or syllabi as long as they are published by the university. Course descriptions that are submitted by the applicant must be sent electronically in PDF format as an attachment to a help ticket within MyNCEES.
Report Generation: Once all documents are in and verified, your report should take no more than 15 business days. You can monitor the status of your application through your MyNCEES account. To monitor the receipt of your documentation, select update education from your profile, which is located in the dropdown menu next to your username at the top of the screen. The status of each document will be noted below the appropriate school entry.
Following Up: You must follow up with the state board. It’s the State board that will give you direction on your next course of action.

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Content of the Evaluation Report

The evaluation will contain:

An applicant summary
A comparability summary which includes the evaluation result (whether the NCEES Engineering Education Standard has been met), and any area(s) of deficiency relative to the standard.
An education summary including institution(s) attended, major(s), and degree(s) earned
A CRITERIA ANALYSIS which breaks down coursework corresponding to the NCEES standard

Multistate Licensure and NCEES Record

For those seeking licensure in multiple states or territories, apply for an NCEES Record. NCEES will review your materials and, after your Record is established, electronically submit them directly to the licensing board on your behalf. This saves time and simplifies the application process when you need to practice in multiple states and territories.

An NCEES Record is a verified compilation of information an applicant is required to submit to a state licensing board as part of the licensure application process. An NCEES Record eliminates the hassle of resubmitting your academic transcripts, exam results, employment history and verifications, and professional references each time you apply for comity licensure. The NCEES Record is designed to meet the licensure requirements of most states. In most cases, requests for additional information are as simple as requiring the applicant to complete a state application and pay a state application fee.

Completing the Application for NCEES Record

The application is divided into five sections:

Education information: Details for each college, university, and technical school you attended. Transcripts are required for all work for which academic credit is awarded.
Work experience: Chronological listing of work experience beginning with graduation from a university or the first employment after high school. There can be no gaps in the complete chronological listing of your work experience. Include employment with organizations that are not engineering or surveying firms and employment not directly related to engineering or surveying work. If you delayed entering college, you must account for work experience beginning with graduation from high school, whether or not it’s engineering or surveying related. Differentiate between part-time and full-time employment. If a former employer is deceased, a firm has dissolved, or a firm is now operating under a different name, you can use a coworker or client to verify the experience. Verification of self-employment must be obtained from an associate or client, preferably a licensed engineer or surveyor. You cannot verify your own self employment. Periods of time that cannot be verified should be marked as self verified. All work experience must have been completed work, not anticipated work. If you have just started a new job, you can add it to your work experience page, but self verify the work instead of entering someone to sign off on it. Once you have worked there for long enough to have work to discuss/describe, then you can change the entry to have someone to sign off on it.Work experience entries should describe engineering projects on which you personally worked. Each entry is broken into Tasks and Duties and Projects. For Projects, include the project name, location, dates of the project and the exact engineering or surveying work you personally performed. To meet the requirements of most state licensing boards, select a supervisor or department manager who was licensed as an engineer or surveyor, as appropriate, at the time of your employment. Unverified work experience does not apply when calculating experience for MLE, MLS, or MLSE status. If there is not someone that is licensed that can sign off on the work experience, it is okay to have someone else who worked with you during the entire time frame sign off on the entry. It typically takes NCEES about 3-7 days to get to your work entry in our queue and either provide feedback or approve the entry. If feedback is given, you will need to adjust your entry accordingly and submit the entry for review again. Once the entry is approved, the entry is sent to your respondent for verification. The status of each work experience entry is provided via the applicant’s MyNCEES account. Pending NCEES means that NCEES is reviewing the entry. Approved/Complete means the entry was approved by NCEES and signed off on by your respondent. You should try to limit your entries to one for each employer. Each entry will generate a verification form that must be completed by a supervisor and returned to NCEES. Multiple entries are usually unnecessary and can slow the completion process. When describing a group project, focus only on your specific responsibilities. Do not include the roles and responsibilities of your coworkers. Do not include language similar to what you would find on a résumé or job proposal. Only work of an engineering nature is creditable, and this work usually follows graduation with a bachelor’s degree. The specific work includes typical descriptive activities as described above. Experience is not credible if it was obtained in violation of the licensure law. Carefully review the information provided and make any necessary changes before submitting your information for review. Changes to this information cannot be made once submitted.
Questions for the applicant: A brief series of questions regarding the status and history of your license.
Exam and license verification: The appropriate state licensing board must verify all exam and license information provided by the applicant.
Professional References: Five references who can reflect the character and diversity of your experience and are personally acquainted with your professional reputation. For engineering applicants, references must be engineers who are licensed in the United States. For surveying applicants, references must be surveyors who are licensed in the United States.

Time and Cost Considerations for NCEES Record

There is no charge to complete the application process and no annual renewal fee. The online application process can be completed in about 30 days. The time depends on how long it takes to verify your information. You can check the status of your application at any time via the multi-state licensure dashboard in your MyNCEES account. Dashboard sections that are highlighted in green are complete. Your Record does not require annual renewal. You will be required to review and update your Record each time you transmit to a state licensing board. Some verifications are valid for a short period of time and should not be updated and re-verified until you are ready to transmit. Past work experience verifications do not expire.

Model Law Designations (MLE and MLS)

The NCEES Records program reviews applicants for designation as a Model Law Engineer (MLE) and Model Law Surveyor (MLS). These designations indicate to state licensing boards that your education, experience, and examinations meet the NCEES Model Law requirements. In many states, this will further expedite the comity licensure process. When you apply for an NCEES Record, staff will review your file to determine if it meets the Model Law criteria. You do not have to request this. The MLSE is an additional designation in the NCEES Records program and can be acquired through application in the existing Record holder account for qualifying individuals.

Fee Structure

Fees are paid at the end of the application process. Note that all refunds will be subject to a $50 administrative fee.

Other NCEES Services

NCEES also provides services such as exam registration. To register for an exam, log in to your MyNCEES account.

The Value of Professional Licensure

Each step in the path to professional licensure is critical. It is a path that ensures individuals practice in a manner that protects the health, safety, and welfare of the public by satisfying qualifications in education, work experience, and exams. In addition to education and experience requirements, engineers and surveyors must typically pass two exams to become professionally licensed.

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