October 2014 SE Test - How did it go?

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I took vertical and lateral (bridge) first time and felt time is extremely tight. Guess about 6~7 questions of morning and hardly to finish all for afternoon.

But anyway I would say it's much easier than the NCEES practice exams.

I will have to re-take both next April.

Since I only spent two months to prepare two exams, nothing to complain.


I see you're from NY...where did you end up taking it??

And after seeing the assessment as to what it takes to get "Acceptable", I can now confidently say I didn't pass haha. I was hoping acceptable was showing all the proper steps with some screw ups in there. I feel like I definitely screwed up every problem to some degree...came up with answers for everything, but none that I was rock solid on either. I guess we'll see. I feel like I successfully got 4 "Needs Improvement" based on how it was just described haha. Maybe I'll surprise myself.


Albany. only I and other building guy.

I think it's hard to show all the proper steps in such a short time, not mention to get everything right.

I guess it will be acceptable if you finish above 75% questions.
Ah okay cool. I was wondering if we had just taken the test together in CT.

Yeah, I can't imagine that any of my answers were "unacceptable" on the afternoon, but based on the previous description, I guess it's totally possible.

 
I think if you demonstrate that you knew what you were doing you can get acceptable. I seem to recall some people on here not finishing a problem but writing out the steps. They didn't pass but saw that they got acceptable even though they didn't finish the problem.

 
I think if you demonstrate that you knew what you were doing you can get acceptable. I seem to recall some people on here not finishing a problem but writing out the steps. They didn't pass but saw that they got acceptable even though they didn't finish the problem.


I didn't have that situation because I did finish everything...though I might have skipped a couple parts and said what I would be checking or what the next steps would be, but knew I was running low on time. I think I showed competency in what I was doing, but somewhere along the lines would get a wrong number. Not THAT often, but I'd get to a point where let's say I used the wrong value, or maybe I didn't determine something the proper way in one part, but the rest of it I showed the proper path.

The one thing this test revealed is that my basic knowledge of statics and theories and anything that's not code-related is limited at this point in my career. I've relied on computers all too much lately. Code stuff, I was rock solid on. I have experience with every code that is on the book (really except the Seismic Design Manual). But I was surprised at how bad of an actual engineer this test revealed me to be haha.

 
One thing I have learned is that completing each problem, calculations and all, is not necessarily a good gauge of your competency, for PM. The afternoon questions do not explicitly give you a heads up about everything you need to cover and recognize. You can easily go through each problem, answer each question seemingly thoroughly, get reasonable numbers and yet miss what I call 'deal breakers'. Like perfectly designing a special braced frame connection in detail, but you used the actual load instead of the expected brace strength. Something like that exposes you and likely is a big point loss. However, making a lot of calculation errors and maybe not finishing the problem but you state the importance of using the expected brace load is probably going to better demonstrate your competence. This is why I have learned not to trust how I feel after the exam, because you don't know what you don't know.

 
One thing I have learned is that completing each problem, calculations and all, is not necessarily a good gauge of your competency, for PM. The afternoon questions do not explicitly give you a heads up about everything you need to cover and recognize. You can easily go through each problem, answer each question seemingly thoroughly, get reasonable numbers and yet miss what I call 'deal breakers'. Like perfectly designing a special braced frame connection in detail, but you used the actual load instead of the expected brace strength. Something like that exposes you and likely is a big point loss. However, making a lot of calculation errors and maybe not finishing the problem but you state the importance of using the expected brace load is probably going to better demonstrate your competence. This is why I have learned not to trust how I feel after the exam, because you don't know what you don't know.


Haha that is definitely not a comforting thing to hear! Oh well. I thought they just told you whether what you got was acceptable, needs improvement, or unacceptable. They tell you specifically where you lost credit? Or are you speculating on that being the case as to how it's scored?

I thought I was going to be able to just let go after the test was over, but now I'm more anxious than before the test! With each comment, I'm feeling less and less confident haha.

 
I am way more anxious now than before the test. I keep thinking of little things that I did wrong and its breaking me down. I hope Agostage is right. I hope they are more interested in methodology and logic than actual numbers. When you're burning through 16 hours of test its so easy to make careless errors. And it seems like I've heard of people who felt really good about the test fail and others who have walked out feeling defeated end up passing. So, I don't know what to think.

 
I believe they are more interested in methodology but obviously numbers count as well.

In the end, we really can only make very, very rough guesses on the grading methodology. No sense worrying too much as we'll all find out in 6 weeks.

 
No they don't give you a breakdown for the PM, only whether it was acceptable, needs improvement or unacceptable as you already know. My observations are based on which answers of mine were considered acceptable over several attempts. For example, I've gotten acceptable results on problems I know I didn't finish or was way off but genuinely knew what I was doing. I recognized how off the answer must be and acknowledged it. That was acceptable.

Was not my intent to cause stress, no one here needs that. I recommend cautious optimism, and not to think about it too much.

 
No they don't give you a breakdown for the PM, only whether it was acceptable, needs improvement or unacceptable as you already know. My observations are based on which answers of mine were considered acceptable over several attempts. For example, I've gotten acceptable results on problems I know I didn't finish or was way off but genuinely knew what I was doing. I recognized how off the answer must be and acknowledged it. That was acceptable.

Was not my intent to cause stress, no one here needs that. I recommend cautious optimism, and not to think about it too much.


I see what you're saying. And it's just my own insecurities playing games with me...I didn't mean to put that on you!

You guys are right...we really shouldn't worry about it because it's out of our control anyway! (unless one of you is an expert grader...then I beg for leniency)

 
I have heard that they get professional engineers to take the exam and then come up with a pass/fail grade based off the average grades of those results (or probably some sort of statistical method).

Yeah, I would love not to worry about. I'm sure in a week or two I will be able to put it in the back of my mind.

 
Yes Dave you are absolutely right. I don't know what method they use but I was involved in something similar in the past with the Seismic exam for getting Pe in California.

 
I have heard that they get professional engineers to take the exam and then come up with a pass/fail grade based off the average grades of those results (or probably some sort of statistical method).

Yeah, I would love not to worry about. I'm sure in a week or two I will be able to put it in the back of my mind. 
Wait, they get PEs to take the SE to judge a curve? That doesn't make any sense to me. What does a PE have to do with an SE? I have a PE but that wouldn't prepare me any more or any less for this test.
 
I have heard that they get professional engineers to take the exam and then come up with a pass/fail grade based off the average grades of those results (or probably some sort of statistical method).

Yeah, I would love not to worry about. I'm sure in a week or two I will be able to put it in the back of my mind.
Wait, they get PEs to take the SE to judge a curve? That doesn't make any sense to me. What does a PE have to do with an SE? I have a PE but that wouldn't prepare me any more or any less for this test.
I am 100% sure you have to be SE in order to see a sample SE Exam. I think he meant professional as licensed on that specific field you are taking the exam.

 
So it hit me yesterday what they were asking for one of the questions. Something about the way they worded the question threw me off. Now I'm real upset because I know exactly how to solve it but wrote calcs that weren't relevant. Did anyone have a similar experience?

 
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Nope, I've almost completely forgotten the questions, but I wouldn't rule out me misinterpreting the question!

 
Dave,

You forgot the most important thing after finishing the exam..... to start drinking heavily.

The way I always felt with these things is that there isn't any way to change it after the fact so you might as well make the best of the situation.

 
So it hit me yesterday what they were asking for one of the questions. Something about the way they worded the question threw me off. Now I'm real upset because I know exactly how to solve it but wrote calcs that weren't relevant. Did anyone have a similar experience?


Nope, seemed straight-forward to me.

 
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