Justin,
There has been and will continue to be a lot of debate on this issue. I have made my opinion known (I believe I see eye to eye with you on it). I think I can also answer some of your questions. For example, you ask how someone can pass the CWI test without an understanding of welder qualification documentation. Well, the candidate has only to achieve a minimum 72% on each of the three parts of the CWI exam. As each part of the exam must cover many aspects, there are not that many questions about welder qualification. In fact, I am certain that the candidate could answer incorrectly all of the questions regarding welder qualification and still pass the test (providing of course the candidate did well enough on the rest of it). Seventy-two percent is not a particularly high bar.
The fact is that AWS will never be able to certify an inspector's total competence. Your welder examples (e.g. bouncing manlift) are excellent analogies. A CWI test, like a welder's test, will simply tell you if the person has the minimum skill set to qualify to do the job - it won't tell you if the person actually can do a good job day in and day out (maybe the welder can't weld left-handed with a mirror like we need, or maybe the inspector doesn't know enough about the code we're using on this job). I believe that AWS QC1 states this very well where it describes the employer's responsibilities to ensure that a CWI under their employ "...is capable of performing the duties involved in his/her particular welding inspection assignment".
I believe that code book endorsements simply give the employer (or other responsible party, such as the owner, regulatory authority, etc) a lazy man's way out of doing their due diligence - "Oh, I see that CWI Richard Head here has passed a test on AWS D1.1. That's good enough for us!!" Of course they never bother to verify Richard's capability by other means so never discover that he tested 8 years ago (and since then there have been 4 revisions) and that he only got a 72% grade and that he has only used D1.1 for 6 months out of the last 8 years. I'm not sure about you, but if I knew all that I would come to the conclusion that I wouldn't be able to simply hang my hat on that code book endorsement.
And this gets me back to your question about a CWI who doesn't understand welder qualification paperwork. If I am an employer or owner or government regulator and I am looking at employing/approving a CWI for duties that will be primarily related to welder qualification, I need to make sure that person can handle it. In fact, if I am an employer of CWIs, AWS QC1 at paragraph 1.4 tells me it is my responsibility to do so. If I know that a person can get all of the welder qualification questions wrong on his/her code book test and still pass, then that code book test should mean nothing to me and I should use other means to ensure that CWI is capable of performing the job.
Mankenberg
I think we do see eye to eye. The certs mean one meets the minimum requirements... on-the-job day-to-day competence is (as you stated) the employer's responsibility for a CWI, just as it is for welders. There's no way for AWS to control this, after the exam is passed. AWS is no more responsible for a lazy/incompetent CWI than a test facility is for a welder who passed a 6G pipe test but can't do his/her job when put out in the field under real-life conditions.
If CWI competence/quality is a concern, it seems like the initial exam is a good place to start. Break it out into more categories with minimum pass scores maybe? I agree that one could pass the exam with little to no knowledge on welder qualification documents (even then you have a 25% chance of guessing right!). That seems a bit odd, doesn't it? I agree with your statement that such a test would mean nothing to me, if I were engaging a CWI involved in such documentation.
AWS-
Please don't de-value my CWI credentials by introducing new "supplemental endorsements" that give companies a warm and fuzzy about someone before they have done due diligence in evaluating a CWI's knowledge/experience, and imply a lack of knowledge if one is without them. I understand that this is not the intent, but I can almost guarantee that will be the result.
Edit-
I understand that the endorsement in question here only applies to AWS ATFs, I guess I may be applying the slippery slope argument here. Once CWI competence is questioned by implication (via an endorsement requirement), the floodgates may be opened, so to speak. Fix the initial test, fix the re-certs, but I (for whatever it is or isn't worth) oppose endorsements that cover something we as CWI should already know.
And understand, of course, there will always be those who are just really good test-takers, who can pass a test after some home study and/or a shake-and-bake course, with little to no knowledge of what the job really entails. There will always be those.
Its interesting, we have another thread that talks of degreed welding engineers. OSU is a top notch university and they have a superb welding engineering curriculum and many graduates, many of which I can sincerely call freinds, are brilliant. And yet, they still graduate morons from time to time as welding engineers. This is not a critique of OSU. Not at all. It just happens thats all. So how tough would it be for AWS to eliminate morons with a seminar and a single test. Not matter what, it will still happen. :)
Arctic 510
Justin. I have proposed eliminating the "Pay your fee three year renewals" of the CWI Cert for a long time. I do not even get a "Second" to the motion when I bring it up in the QC-1 Subcommittee meeting. Last month, I proposed it informally because the Certification Committee was making a recommendation to the Qualification Committee that they needed to update the B5 document. I proposed that we could give a drawings reading exam for the first renewal, and WPS / WPQR / WQR testing at the second renewal. I also proposed that we eliminate the options for nine year re-certification via the CEU/PDH, or Boot Camp, or Endorsement routes. I didn't get anywhere. If I had my way you would be hearing nothing but how I was trying to gouge the inspectors so that AWS could get richer!
The AWS is married to the two hour "Multiple Guess" test routine, and the economic ramifications of changing it will not fly in my lifetime. Remember the AWS needs to make money on all certification programs. The programs have to follow national standards and test methodology, or the AWS could be successfully sued. Although AWS needs to make money to run the certification programs and it's other operations, the Certification Committee itself wants first and foremost, have professional programs. The Certification Committee puts making money somewhere down around fifth or sixth place. As you can imagine. the "all volunteer" committee has a lot of high caliber talent and opinions as how this should be done. In the end that is where the "Minimum Consensus" process shines brightest. All the "Egos" get balanced out by all the anti-egos, and a middle of the road minimum consensus is reached for the final document.
( A minimum consensus document is one where all the proponents of a document get together and argue what should be in it. In the end, after all the arguments, the members all sign a document that is the most compromise they could stand for and agree on! No one is really happy!)
Last month, I tried once again to get us to vote on eliminating the CAWI altogether. I had a Second, but when the seconder found out that his agenda item was not included in this motion, he withdrew his second, and my motion died. No, it was not really "Politics",and not really "Ego". I knew I had an up-hill battle for that idea.
I agree that the shake and bake courses are to blame for a lot of people passing the examination, who do not really have all the experience specified B5.1 document. I do not see any practical way of stopping it. The idea of making the examination more comprehensive is the best way, but the test would then take four days and cost $2000.00 more!
I disagree with you completely on the "Endorsements". I am the father of the "Endorsements" idea. My not so humble Ego thinks it is the greatest idea since sliced bread! Sorry! (Well, NO; Come to think of it, I'm not sorry!!!!) If the endorsement availability results in the endorsement being required, I am all for that too. I saw the D1.1 and D1.5 endorsement being required well before AWS gave out the first examination! It was one of the reasons I proposed and worked for the idea so long.
I think that renewal exams could be given through the US Mail, but I have certain prejudices about letting the exam get out to several overseas countries. As for your "30 foot in the air endorsement" allegory, I recently observed a "person of note", famous for doing UT testing while rappelling from sky-scrapers, performing UT to D1.1 on the ground. He didn't have a clue! So, I can also see some requirement like that as not being so unreasonable. I knew an "Underwater UT expert" who didn't have a clue as to how to do it on dry ground! So, I wonder how they managed to do it in the air or under water correctly!?!?!? Of course I have seen more than a dozen dry ground UT Practitioners who also didn't have a Clue!
Justin, I think you may have some solid ideas and honest concerns. The rules and changes to the programs are made by volunteers, who pay their own travel, meals, administrative costs and hotel fees to attend and work on the Committee and Subcommittees. There is always room on Subcommittees. Do you think you would be interested in attending and joining in? Changes cannot be made on the Forum. It is even difficult to transcribe ideas from the forum to the Subcommittee, because one does not get to see all the pros and cons on the forum that you would get in face to face meetings.
Joe Kane