April 2019 SE Results Thread

[TehMightyEngineer]

Correct. 

This is almost unbelievable. About the only way I can see this passing is if you nailed the multiple choice. I was unable to find someone who felt they had nailed a multiple choice  and got an unacceptable a afternoon problem. I've always wondered if this was considered a passing score by NCEES and, if you truly didn't write anything for an afternoon problem, then you may have done just that. Another consideration is they threw out a portion of the afternoon problem you didn't complete so you got partial credit even though you did no work. That seems unlikely though.

Either way, good info. How well do you think you did on the morning section?

Why not? Is 75% not enough? My biggest problem is that I cannot work through all four problems in 4 hours. 

Our previous data (which is always going to be incomplete since we only see failing scores and not passing scores) was that an unacceptable fails an exam with even a really good morning score.

• 33/40 - Acceptable, Acceptable, Acceptable, Unacceptable 
  
• 35/40 - Acceptable, Acceptable, Unacceptable
  

The above are the highest morning scores that I've found mentioned here that still had a failure. Both appear to have been failed by that unacceptable. I've had confirmation that an acceptable on an afternoon can be obtained with partial work but never with no work done; that seems like it would always default to unacceptable. Thus, you passing would signal to me that you got better than 35/40 on the morning or they gave you credit due to a error on that question. Either way, huge congratulations.

First post but I've been following this thread for a long time.  I got my results an hour ago from NCEES.  I passed!  WhooHoo!  Took the vertical in 2018 and the lateral this year. Good luck to the rest of you!

View attachment 13394

Congratulations! Nice to get those done one year apart. All the people on year 3+ are jealous of you.

Whelp NCEES, you got me. I fucking give the fuck up.

Damn, sorry to see you throw in the towel but I can understand that. You're definitely close but I know you've been close for a while. I hope you still have some value in the experience working towards the exam.

So did I add that up right, you got 23/40 and A/A/A/IR and still didnt pass? WTF.

Yeah, you probably needed around 26-27 on the morning judging from the other scores that failed.

Those scores are better than the previously estimated cut lines posted here

Not really, 26-27 is likely the target for the morning on this exam based on my previous estimates of cut scores. Definitely a ton of people who are very close though.

Failed buildings lateral 2nd try,

27/40

Needs Improvement, Acceptable, Unacceptable, Acceptable.

If I had just done better on the general analysis PM question #803 looks like I would have passed!

This is killing me!! Going through this again will be torture!

Dang, I agree that 803 probably killed you. Good luck next time around and stay motivated; you're so close.

First time taker for both building portions

Passed Vertical
Lateral 24/40; A,A,IR, UA

Some of those morning questions must have been brutal or tricky. Lots of people scoring in this range on the morning.

I will study harder.

Passed Vertical.

Lateral 24/40; A A A. (very surprising afternoon result, but I guess nothing to complain.)

Wow, you must have been very close. Definitely worth some praise getting 3 acceptables. Congrats on passing vertical.

Congratulations to all who passed; and good work to all regardless of your score. Everyone is clearly working really hard on these exams and I hope you're becoming a better engineer regardless of whether you pass on your first or sixth time.

It will be interesting to see what the change in passing rate are for April's exam period. For records, this is December's pass rate:


SE Lateral Forces Bridges


38


16%


45


36%


P&P


Twice per year


Dec 2018


SE Lateral Forces Buildings


241


36%


264


38%


P&P


Twice per year


Dec 2018


SE Vertical Forces Bridges


44


32%


20


45%


P&P


Twice per year


Dec 2018


SE Vertical Forces Buildings


300


36%


206


21%


P&P


Twice per year


Dec 2018

 

[Engi-nerd]

Continental Testing has Illinois results posted on their website

 

[mstructural]

Michigan out. Failed

 22/40

3A 1 IR

Didn’t know you can now take the SE exam in Michigan. Where in MI did you take? I took the SE last year in Illinois and passed. Had to drive 4 hours each way to take it. That made it even more special. Congrats to all those who passed!

 

[Duke]

Continental Testing has Illinois results posted on their website

Thanks for sharing, can confirm CTS has posted.

 

[Hindianapolis]

Didn’t know you can now take the SE exam in Michigan. Where in MI did you take? I took the SE last year in Illinois and passed it. Had to drive 4 hours each way to take it. That made even more special. Congrats to all those who passed!

I took it in Macomb Community College 

 

[mstructural]

I took it in Macomb Community College 

That’s cool @Hindianapolis That’s where I took my PE exam too many moons ago.

So would your license be issued by the State of Michigan if you’d passed? Did you register through LARA?

 

[LetsSE]

Yep, the only thing in my mind now is the footing was killing me.

Man, I feel I am really getting old now. You still remember things. I will definitely begin study from tonight.

I passed lateral bridges this April and with the vertical bridges passed last oct. I could be officially licensed as SE.

Good Luck Everyone.

 

[Stewie]

I passed lateral bridges this April and with the vertical bridges passed last oct. I could be officially licensed as SE.

Good Luck Everyone.

nice job! congratulations!

 

[EgineerBC]

I took Vertical in Oregon, and passed. Good luck everyone.

 

[Chuckimus]

I spent the entire afternoon working on the three I attempted, and I would be surprised if I didn't get full credit for all of them. So, I think an acceptable has a range, and enough points lost on multiple problems along with an unacceptable will fail you on the afternoon.

 

[ChaosMuppetPE]

@TehMightyEngineer

The following items are what I've gained from study of this exam:

Gravity - absolutely nothing but I've been designing for around 14 years now. More if you count side work during graduate school.

Lateral - I learned a few things. First, I specifically learned special seismic detailing after paying out the ass for it as nobody in the southeast uses it. Second, I've learned that the older I get, the worse I am at these shitty licensure exams as I've never came close to failing an exam before in my life and I've now failed this one (4) fucking times. Third, I can't tell what most of the problems on that report are but I remember pulling everything from the cold formed framing directly out of the AISI and somehow that was still marked as incorrect (I missed 15 more problems than I anticipated on the morning section, something isn't right there. I'm concerned I may have screwed my bubbling up because of the bridge problems I skipped, I'll never know though, because fuck NCEES.), I don't trust my licensing organizations, the state board, or the NCEES themselves anymore and I will harbor a FUCKING hatred of all of these fucking fuckers for the rest of my fucking career. Fourth, GA is retarded for accepting this test as the only means of licensure for a glorified fucking house designer (myself). Fifth, this has made me ponder why it is easier and easier to become a contractor while code requirements on engineers are getting more stringent. Sixth, this has made me wonder why the fuck I became an engineer in the first place as I believe I've been caught in the middle of something I should've been grandfathered in on, FUCK NCEES again and the GA board. Seventh, why keep changing the damn codes? This is getting fucking ridiculous all of you fucking fuck code changing fuckers. We aren't having failures from the older codes. FUCK. Eighth, I now wonder why the boards keep adopting these new codes and why any state would make this test their only route to licensure when they aren't even a seismic state. Ninth, I hate NCEES 3000. Tenth, I hate the GA board ∞. Eleventh, I now know how to make infinity on the keyboard (ALT + 236). Twelfth, engineers don't make enough money to go through this horse shit so the fucking boards had better be careful, otherwise they aren't going to have any fucking engineers. Thirteenth,  how in the absolute fucking fucktardation can you fail someone on a God Damn competency exam when they absolutely fucking showed that they were competent with written problems? That's a rhetorical question. FUCK. Last, I think I'm going to become a God Damn contractor as they make twice as much as engineers and they can apparently eat fucking paint chips while doing so because those fuckers are stupid.

 

[Nathan55]

Not to add accelerant to the conflagration, FutureSE...but, some things I noticed, running some numbers...

About 1200 people take the SE exam (includes buildings and bridges) between the two days. In fall, maybe we assume 1000 people. At 500$ a pop, that gives NCEES an annual revenue of about 1.1 million dollars for the SE exam. With a pass rate hovering around 30%, accountants can rely on 70% of the people being repeat customers. That's a take rate that would make Steve Jobs envious. Even iPhone upgrades are done yearly; imagine if every 6 months they had a new one, and 70% of the buyers would replace their model? It's genius. 

Also, every 10% increase in the pass rate results in a loss of 120,000$ per year of NCEES. I'd be very curious, from a financial standpoint, whether NCEES could even sustain providing the test if the pass rate were 50 or 60%. The locked in revenue would be half of what they usually can count on. I'd posit the answer is no.

 

[TehMightyEngineer]

@TehMightyEngineer

The following items are what I've gained from study of this exam:

Gravity - absolutely nothing but I've been designing for around 14 years now. More if you count side work during graduate school.

Lateral - I learned a few things. First, I specifically learned special seismic detailing after paying out the ass for it as nobody in the southeast uses it. Second, I've learned that the older I get, the worse I am at these shitty licensure exams as I've never came close to failing an exam before in my life and I've now failed this one (4) fucking times. Third, I can't tell what most of the problems on that report are but I remember pulling everything from the cold formed framing directly out of the AISI and somehow that was still marked as incorrect (I missed 15 more problems than I anticipated on the morning section, something isn't right there. I'm concerned I may have screwed my bubbling up because of the bridge problems I skipped, I'll never know though, because fuck NCEES.), I don't trust my licensing organizations, the state board, or the NCEES themselves anymore and I will harbor a FUCKING hatred of all of these fucking fuckers for the rest of my fucking career. Fourth, GA is retarded for accepting this test as the only means of licensure for a glorified fucking house designer (myself). Fifth, this has made me ponder why it is easier and easier to become a contractor while code requirements on engineers are getting more stringent. Sixth, this has made me wonder why the fuck I became an engineer in the first place as I believe I've been caught in the middle of something I should've been grandfathered in on, FUCK NCEES again and the GA board. Seventh, why keep changing the damn codes? This is getting fucking ridiculous all of you fucking fuck code changing fuckers. We aren't having failures from the older codes. FUCK. Eighth, I now wonder why the boards keep adopting these new codes and why any state would make this test their only route to licensure when they aren't even a seismic state. Ninth, I hate NCEES 3000. Tenth, I hate the GA board ∞. Eleventh, I now know how to make infinity on the keyboard (ALT + 236). Twelfth, engineers don't make enough money to go through this horse shit so the fucking boards had better be careful, otherwise they aren't going to have any fucking engineers. Thirteenth,  how in the absolute fucking fucktardation can you fail someone on a God Damn competency exam when they absolutely fucking showed that they were competent with written problems? That's a rhetorical question. FUCK. Last, I think I'm going to become a God Damn contractor as they make twice as much as engineers and they can apparently eat fucking paint chips while doing so because those fuckers are stupid.

I like your humor and agree with you more than generally I'd like to admit.

I 100% agree with fuck NCEES, but my anger stems from their records debacle. For me I passed the SE when I felt I deserved to pass so that's been my experience; however you're not the first person to feel unfairly treated by this exam so perhaps I'm just lucky?

Regardless, I agree with you on the state of engineering as an industry. Seems like you've really got the short end of the stick in a lot of things. Hopefully you can find a way out of the regional BS you're dealing with. Change of local maybe?

 

[Chuckimus]

Passed vertical. For the record, I passed both with A A A U in the afternoon. 

 

[crammer]

Passed vertical. For the record, I passed both with A A A U in the afternoon. 

Congrats!  Did you leave the 4th problem blank on both?

 

[Saluki21]

How do you know you passed with 3 acceptable and 1 unacceptable?

 

[StandardPractice]

I passed the vertical 1st try. I failed the lateral four times in a row. The state of GA says that I have to re-submit my application AFTER taking 12 hours of graduate level coursework at an accredited university. This could cost thousands and take a long time. My vertical portion is good until 2022. What are my options here? Should I apply to take the exam in another state and try to get reciprocity with GA? If I did that, would the vertical part still be good or would I have to retake? Anyone been in this situation before? Any information or advice would be appreciated. Thanks! 

I would think where you pass each part of the SE exam wouldn't matter as 'how the exam is administered' is not state dependent. In other words same exam taken in GA would be same one taken in NC. I've definitely heard of folks taking PE exam in other states if they hit the max retake number. They just had to physically drive to exam site that's out of state. Have you taken a review course? I'm pretty sure that may count instead of dropping a few thousand and years on courses and if this is try #4 it may help you get over that last hump. 

 

[Chuckimus]

Congrats!  Did you leave the 4th problem blank on both?

How do you know you passed with 3 acceptable and 1 unacceptable?

Only on the lateral. I started the fourth on the vertical, but didn't get far.

 

[ChaosMuppetPE]

I passed the vertical 1st try. I failed the lateral four times in a row. The state of GA says that I have to re-submit my application AFTER taking 12 hours of graduate level coursework at an accredited university. This could cost thousands and take a long time. My vertical portion is good until 2022. What are my options here? Should I apply to take the exam in another state and try to get reciprocity with GA? If I did that, would the vertical part still be good or would I have to retake? Anyone been in this situation before? Any information or advice would be appreciated. Thanks! 

Almost in the same situation as you. Passed vertical first try, can't get through lateral to save my life despite the fact I fully believe I am more than competent in the subject now. I originally applied in GA  but they deleted my original application after denying reciprocity (because they are GA I guess) and I didn't trust them to get me registered so I went to Alabama. Alabama has one of the best and most responsive boards I've dealt with. You can call them and the BOARD answers, not the crappy SOS as in GA. Alabama will let you test there. My suggestion is resister there. GA absolutely sucks in comparison. AL may not like abortion (I really don't either, but maybe it's because I was born in Bama), but they are at least engineering friendly.

 

[Hindianapolis]

Passed vertical. For the record, I passed both with A A A U in the afternoon. 

@TehMightyEngineer

from what i understood from your famous cut score post, you cannot pass with a single Unacceptable PM problem. How is this possible?