Sir: It was interesting to read Barry Spurr’s article in the September Quadrant, “Reclaiming the Teaching Profession”. I read it from the viewpoint of another profession, in my case, engineering. Engineering is an example of the unwarranted influence of academia on many vocations. As one person remarked, “it is as if we handed foreign policy over to ammunition manufacturers”. Society appears to have handed academics the role of gatekeepers, without recognising the innate conflict of interest. Perhaps the most highly regarded profession of all, surgery, is one of the last hold-outs. To become a surgeon you go through an apprenticeship process and…