# Ban Exam Prep



## romdrv56 (Dec 6, 2012)

Just my opinion. Exam prep shall be banned.

It is scary if new PEs need someone to hold their hand to pass.


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## roadwreck (Dec 6, 2012)

not sure if serious?


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## Lumber Jim (Dec 6, 2012)

Wow, this one could go in a lot of different directions. Do yo have any logic to cite?


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## knight1fox3 (Dec 6, 2012)

romdrv56 said:


> Just my opinion. Exam prep shall be banned.
> 
> It is scary if new PEs need someone to hold their hand to pass.


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## Capt Worley PE (Dec 6, 2012)

roadwreck said:


> not sure if serious?


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## Undertaker (Dec 6, 2012)

Dude's probably an architect.


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## PeonPE (Dec 6, 2012)

Captain Worley made me laugh!


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## Dexman PE PMP (Dec 6, 2012)

fuller57 said:


> Captain Worley made me laugh!


He beat me to it...


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## Road Guy (Dec 6, 2012)

If a PE is new then he/she wouldn't need help to pass the PE, since by virtue of being a new PE wouldn't they already be a PE?

I'm confused.....


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## CivilConstruction (Dec 6, 2012)

Tell NCEES to give me a test specific to what I do and then I wouldn't need to get help with water resources.


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## sumpnz (Dec 6, 2012)

CivilConstruction said:


> Tell NCEES to give me a test specific to what I do and then I wouldn't need to get help with water resources.


+1 (though in my case that would involve thermo and HVAC)


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## RIP - VTEnviro (Dec 6, 2012)

To the OP...

You do realize the point of this forum is for engineers who have already been down that road to offer advice to those preparing to take it?


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## PeonPE (Dec 6, 2012)

Tell NCEES to give me a test about what diners have the best breakfast specials in town and I promise you I can pass. To me THAT would test what's really job-specific to the muncipal worker such as myself.


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## MA_PE (Dec 6, 2012)

I fully agree with the OP. Ban exam prep all together. Anyone that needs to prepare for a test (any test in anything) is obviously not qualified to take the test in the first place. Following this logic, if someone knows the material well enough th pass the test without any preparation then they are experts and don't need to take a test anyway. Therefore, we should probably push to eliminate the test as opposed to eliminating the prepapration for the test.


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## Jaylaw_PE (Dec 6, 2012)

college should be banned too.

if you cant pass the PE right out of high school, then you just aren't smart enough to be an engineer. college is just a crutch.


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## Dexman PE PMP (Dec 6, 2012)

In fact, if your parents aren't smart enough to be engineers, then you're not smart enough to even try for it in HS.


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## Capt Worley PE (Dec 6, 2012)

DERAIL!!!!!


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## Dexman PE PMP (Dec 6, 2012)

Bewbs


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## MA_PE (Dec 6, 2012)

where?


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## ptatohed (Dec 6, 2012)

romdrv56 said:


> Just my opinion. Exam prep shall be banned.
> 
> It is scary if new PEs need someone to hold their hand to pass.


When I read the thread title I thought perhaps you meant ban exam preparation material on exam day as in 'make the PE exam closed book'. And there are some advocates for that. But it seems that you are suggesting that no one should have access to any "exam prep" prior to taking the exam. Is that right? What do you mean by "exam prep"? Review classes? Or physical reference material/books? Or both? Are you saying that you took and passed the exam without studying?


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## knight1fox3 (Dec 6, 2012)

Jaylaw_PE said:


> college should be banned too.
> 
> if you cant pass the PE right out of high school, then you just aren't smart enough to be an engineer. college is just a crutch.


Agreed.

I think we need Otter's help on this one...

EDIT: Otter needs to say it since he says it best.


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## Otter (Dec 6, 2012)

^^

Hey, that's my line!


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## YMZ PE (Dec 7, 2012)

romdrv56 said:


> Just my opinion. Exam prep shall be banned.
> 
> It is scary if new PEs need someone to hold their hand to pass.


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## zhongguo (Jun 25, 2013)

troll alert!


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## Hott (Jun 25, 2013)

Strange post.. any new or “old” PE would agree that certain level of preparation is necessary simply for the reason on limited time to take this exam.. everybody needs to brush up and exercise the necessary speed solving problems.. Unless you’re a genius


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## John QPE (Jun 25, 2013)

I totally agree...because in my day to day activities of designing low impact stormwater BMPs, I frequently design vertical curves and horizontal curves (in addition to the paving sections to go along with the road design) to supplement as filler material in my reports :/


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## Dexman PE PMP (Jun 25, 2013)

30 hours? Why so much?

&lt;--- also took construction, but I've been working construction for over 10 years now (and had 5yrs experience at the time I took it.)


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## Capt Worley PE (Jun 26, 2013)

Dexman PE said:


> 30 hours? Why so much?




Clearly he is barely competant. 30 hrs? Please!

I took the shrink wrap of my MERM during the exam.


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## roadwreck (Jun 26, 2013)

^^

And the only reason you unwrapped it then was to fashion a hat from the shrink wrap.


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## Capt Worley PE (Jun 26, 2013)

^well, it was cold, and I've always heard, "Cold feet, wear a hat."

Plus, the MERM made a nice 'fort' to prevent that other guy at the table from peeking at my perfect calculations.


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## Flyer_PE (Jun 26, 2013)

There was a review manual?


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## Dexman PE PMP (Jun 26, 2013)

The proctors did not appreciate me using my left-over 2 hours of exam time in the morning for building a fort out of my neighbor's reference books. I would have used my own, but I would have had to buy them first, then have to drag them in with me...


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## Capt Worley PE (Jun 26, 2013)

Forts are one of the things I miss most from my childhood.


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## Lumber Jim (Jun 26, 2013)

Took the test in order to get a cool pencil.

snuck the pencil out of the exam room.

Lost said pencil.

Got a stamp that gives me liability as the replacement for the pencil.

Qualifications? yup or they wouldn't have given me the stamp.





Yer welcome.


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## nhzero (Sep 30, 2013)

Ironically, that's almost what happened in my case. I took the PPI online test review (which was truly atrocious), but had foot surgery in January, so didn't really start studying until the last week in February when I went back to work. Since I had been off work so long and had to play catch-up, I didn't get to study much, and also had to teach a 40 hour class. I ended up spending most of my time tabbing my book out instead of doing problems, but on exam day, I found that the tabs were worthless, so I did my entire Thermal Fluids ME exam by using the MERM index that I hadn't looked at until exam day... still passed, though!

Lesson learned? I should have photocopied the index and put it in a binder and taken the NCEES Practice Test instead of spending lots of time and money on the prep course.


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