ENGINEERING GEOLOGY COURSE

In 1994, the Order of the Engineers decided to create a system of accreditation of the engineering courses. The accreditation is the recognition of the quality of the initial formation offered by the course for the engineering practice, and also implies that  the graduates from this course are exempted of the admission test for the Order of the Engineers. According to the data from 2000, amongst the 277 graduations in engineering existing in Portugal, only 77 were accredited by the Order of Engineers.

The Geological Engineering Course of the University of Aveiro was the first course of Geological Engineering course in Portugal to be accredited by the Order of Engineers (http://www.ordeng.pt). Since then, the accreditation has been uninterruptedly renewed until today.

The last renewall of the accreditation was awarded, for a period of three years, in 23 of January of 2003, by the National Directing Council of the Order of Engineers, based on a report from the Commision of the Accreditation of Engineering Geology.

In 2002/2003 a revised course plan was approved for the Geological Engineering Course, with a reinforcement of the basic disciplines (24%) and the optional topics (5 to 8%). The new course plan has also an increase in Field Geology. There are presently 4 areas of specialization: (1) Geotechnics, (2) Geo-resources, (3) Geo-environmental Studies and (4) Marine Geology.