# Oct 2018 Post Exam Wait - Welcome to the Suck



## RBHeadge PE (Oct 27, 2018)

Welcome to the post October 2018 PE post-exam wait period. A.K.A “Welcome to the Suck”. If you thought studying for the exam and taking the exam was the hard part, well you were wrong. Waiting for the exam results is the worst part of this whole process.

A few years ago @Dexman PE PMP  wrote a famous post ( http://engineerboards.com/topic/21356-feel-good-about-how-you-did-on-the-exam/ ) outlining the stages of the post-exam emotional roller-coaster. I’ve reproduced his immortal words (italics) and added a few new insights and advice below.

*Phase 0 (Emotional Hangover) *This happens immediately after the conclusion of the exam. You spend the next few days bouncing between phases 1-5, either individually or at the same time. You are Heisenberg's test result, simultaneously convinced that you passed and failed at the same time. You'll find yourself suddenly with a lot of free time and no idea what to spend it on (hint: spam thread here or burn off the stress at the gym). You'll be looking at which PE stamps to order, and which PE study classes to take for the next exam. After a few days your brain will slow down and you settle into...

*Phase 1 (CALM)* This stage will last a few days. You are mostly recovered from the mental marathon of the exam and post-exam emotional roller coaster. The full weight of what has just happened hasn’t really set in and you are probably a bit relaxed thinking that the worst is over.

*Phase 2* *(SECOND-GUESSING) *_will start to set in over the next few days. You will start to forget small (but important) pieces of the exam and forget how you answered the question, but will remember just enough so that you keep trying to re-calculate the answers in your head. You will slowly begin to convince yourself that you got it wrong._

*Phase 3* *(WORRY) *_will follow within a few weeks. At this point, you've convinced yourself that you've missed a few problems, but you *should* still be ok._

*Phase 4 (DOUBT)* _After worrying for about a month (we're now within _2-3 _weeks of results at this point), you'll jump into full blown doubt. You are now certain that you missed way too many questions to stand a chance at passing._

*Phase 5 (ANGER)* _Once you've lost hope of passing, you'll move into Phase 5 (anger) over the fact that it's taken way too damn long to grade a simple scantron and the guys at NCEES are morons for taking so long. I mean, really, 6-8 weeks to feed a scantron into a f*ing machine, COME ON!! Another source of anger stems from all of the "Not this shit again" and "Don't try to calc it because it's worthless" responses to all of your cut-score_ and release date_ posts._

BTW, want a sanity check of why it takes so long to “just score a scantron”? look here:

http://engineerboards.com/topic/29578-ncees-news-update/?page=8&amp;tab=comments#comment-7463208
 

*Phase 6 (RESULTS) *_Finally, you'll hit Phase 6 (results). Each person reacts differently at this point whether they passed or not, how many times they've taken it, financial implications, expectations, etc. Regardless of how the results come out, at this point you will find that the CAB of your choice is very welcomed to either celebrate or cry into._

Then there are the sub-phases. These can happen anytime during phases 2, 3, 4, and 5. The order of the sub-phases is arbitrary

*Sub-phase A (Trying to calculate the cut-score)* you’ll start speculating on the cut score, as if it’s universal for all exams. Maybe discussing a question in a nebulous way and convincing yourself that it will get tossed. You start spouting conspiracy theories that there is a quota for maximum and minimum number of passers (there isn’t), or that NCESS wants you to fail to get more of your money (meh, not really).

The cut score will vary from exam session to exam session and from one engineering discipline to another. The cut score is based on what the minimally competent PE would get for that selection of test problems. Yes, PEs and other SMEs take practice exams with those problems to establish a baseline.  It’s futile to try to guess the “cut score”, and even if you could you don’t know your own score anyway, so it really doesn’t matter.

Want a little more elaboration? Look here:

http://engineerboards.com/topic/30365-the-wait-is-killing-me/?do=findComment&amp;comment=7485676

*Sub-phase B (trying to figure out how to get results before they come out)* You’ll start trying to figure out ways to learn of your results before they come out. This will include searching your state’s PE license lookup or another state website, spam calling and emailing NCEES or the state board, etc.

First: Please be nice to your state board workers! You are taking this test to become a professional, so act like a professional.

NCESS won’t tell you anything beyond “8-10 weeks” until after they released the results. The state boards won’t tell you much more and NCESS usually doesn’t share anything firm with them anyway. The boards will often get surprised with the results too. No state starts updating their license lookup prior to the initial release of results. So don’t bother searching there until at least one state has released first! Some states (Mass, NJ, and a couple others) have other websites like   cs: where you can divine a pass/fail, but it won’t happen until other states have already started releasing, and those states tend to release after everyone else too.

*Sub-phase C* *(guessing the release date)* This is another favorite pass time. You’ll start looking through old map threads to try to guess the release date. Maybe you’ll look at state board meetings dates and try to cross reference with the past results to figure out when’s this years’ will come out. Multiple posters look at the (lack of) data and come to a “conclusion” that a given date is “it”. The OG’s tell you that the wait will last a little bit longer, but group-think sets in and the vets get mocked for “trolling”. Things get even worse when the “sure thing” date passes without a release.

No one can say with certainty when the results will be released this early after the exam. With that written, we have been following things for a while and we have an idea of when the release will generally happen. Fall results take longer than spring results because of the holidays and time available to schedule cut score meetings.

The vets may not know the exact date ahead of time, but we generally know the signs and can confidently give a “no earlier than” date. *This is not the same as a release date.* We’ll also know when things are imminent.

Still want to scratch the itch? @Duckdude actually took the time to make a spreadsheet of known release dates for all states for all exams sessions going back for over a decade. And he did it AFTER he got his results back. Great dedication and work on his part! You can browse it here if you are curious.





*Sub-phase D (reading the tea leaves)* This is a variation on subphases B and C, but warrants its own category. You’ll start scrutinizing every NCEES tweet or facebook post, take screenshots and discuss minor tweaks to the dashboard layout, or get over excited when a state board has called an emergency meeting. You look for any clue or edge to see if you passed/failed or when the results may come out.

Sometimes these signs are legit, often they’re not. The OG’s have been tracking things for years and know how to separate the signal from the noise. For instance @knight1fox3 has been playing close attention to the correlations of getting an exam survey back a week after the exam and a pass/fail score.

*Sub-phase E (harassing NCEES and state board employees) *The title says it all, it's an aggravated version of subphase B. Don't be a d$%K and try to avoid this subphase. You aren't doing yourself any favors by acting unprofessional.

*Sub-phase F5 (spam reloading the NCEES dashboard) *During this phase you are continuously reloading the NCEES dashboard and/or refreshing your email.

FWIW, we can confirm that sometimes the examinees' dashboard will update with the result prior to the NCESS email going out. The time difference is anywhere from no-delay to a couple hours. Go ahead and spam F5 the dashboard to blow off steam.

Speaking of blowing off steam, trying the Oct 2018 spam thread:





or any of the other game threads.



> _Also, please remember that all of the senior members have been through this all and consequently will endlessly torment and tease you. We do this simply because it was done to us (I remember going off on Capt Worley for one of his fake results threads back in 2008), and we hope that you all stick around to tease the next round of exam takers. There is nothing personal meant or implied with these teases, we're just trying to lighten the mood._
> 
> _All we can do to manage these feelings is to fully participate in the eb.com post-exam thread (typically the 10k, but may be different this year). Good luck, and we all look forward to meeting many new interesting (and hopefully equally disturbed) engineers and hope you all stick around to see what a fun and entertaining group we can actually be._


And all this leaves out the post-results passed and failed phases, which I’ll post about later.

How does everyone feel about the exam yesterday?


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## RBHeadge PE (Oct 27, 2018)

Over the last few years we've noticed that it generally takes a little over a month for NCEES to work through their baseline scoring processes for the paper and pencil tests to release their score. All of the results are released on the same day for the spring and fall exams respectively, regardless of test discipline. The thing that always “delays” the release of the results beyond that period though, is when a new exam is administered in a given test period.  The exam writers have to a have a meeting to discuss the exam results and adjudicate any problematic exam questions. There are a lot of PPE exams so there is almost always a new exam being given in a given period. By definition, these exam review meetings occur after the initial scoring has taken place. The exams produced by NCEES, tend to schedule those meetings about 25-30 days after the exam. The exams not produced by NCESS (the less practiced disciplines like Nuke, Fire Prot, Petro, etc) tend to be 30-40+ days after the exam.*
*

*There is only one new exam this session: Fire Protection Engineering. Its cut score meeting is Nov 28-29, so results will not arrive before Nov 30.  *

 


*source: https://ncees.org/wp-content/uploads/5_Licensure-Exchange_October-2018.pdf   pg. 11


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## FromThisSoil (Oct 27, 2018)

I’ve already gone through some of those phases out of order and much quicker...

I’m not losing any sleep over waiting for my results, when they come, they come. I’m sleeping well now, even though I’m not so sure how I did. Prior to the exam I was waking up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat from a nightmare on how I couldn’t calculate the moment of inertia of a shape or something equally basic.


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## JayKay PE (Oct 27, 2018)

I’ve accepted my results either way, just happy it is over. Currently celebrating studying freedom by going to the Corning museum of glass and losing myself in cool stuff. Passing would be a nice Christmas present, but my employer isn’t going to fire me for not passing, so there is not much ultra pressure on my side of things!


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## ct27gt (Oct 27, 2018)

Haha. New poster here. I went through Phase 2 last night and skipped straight to Phase 4 this morning! California (not sure if exam differs by state?), Mechanical: Machine Design and Materials

-Joe


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## Mr. Zane (Oct 27, 2018)

Thank you for the semi-annual guide after the exam.

I remembered right there was a short sub-phase before the release which was everyone used the chatbox to bother the NCEES representatives and they all got copy/paste standard response.


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## RBHeadge PE (Oct 27, 2018)

Mr. Zane said:


> I remembered right there was a short sub-phase before the release which was everyone used the chatbox to bother the NCEES representatives and they all got copy/paste standard response.


I put harassing the board and NCEES in sub-phase B. But it probably warrants its own subphase. I'll fix it in April.


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## RBHeadge PE (Oct 29, 2018)

FromThisSoil said:


> I’ve already gone through some of those phases out of order and much quicker...


Yeah, that's normal. It'll settle into more defined categories in the coming days and weeks.



ct27gt said:


> I went through Phase 2 last night and skipped straight to Phase 4 this morning! California (not sure if exam differs by state?), Mechanical: Machine Design and Materials


Also normal, see above. The exam doesn't differ by location. It differs from session to session,  and (obviously) discipline to discipline.


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## txjennah PE (Oct 29, 2018)

I'm in the "self loathing and depression while I figure out what to do with all this free time again" phase.

I think spam will help. Where's the spam thread?  If I want any chance of passing, I need to start spamming ASAP.


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## vee043324 (Oct 29, 2018)

I think the “severe emotional hangover” stage is missing @RBHeadge PE

I’m dead.


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## envirotex (Oct 29, 2018)

txjennah said:


> I think spam will help. Where's the spam thread?  If I want any chance of passing, I need to start spamming ASAP.


Waiting on @NJmike PE...


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## squaretaper LIT AF PE (Oct 29, 2018)

txjennah said:


> I'm in the "self loathing and depression while I figure out what to do with all this free time again" phase.
> 
> I think spam will help. Where's the spam thread?  If I want any chance of passing, I need to start spamming ASAP.


SPAM-a-lama-ding-dong!!!


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## RBHeadge PE (Oct 29, 2018)

Good thoughts. I'll have to add in the emotional hangover phase in April.

@NJmike PE normally does the spam thread the Monday after the exam. He hasn't posted since Mid-September.


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## GeoDude_PE (Oct 29, 2018)

I'm struggling back and forth through multiple phases all at once. I was so disappointed coming out of that exam. Not very much like the practice exams and covered so much more than the expensive course I took to "learn all of the topics" for the exam. Now the waiting games begin...


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## JayKay PE (Oct 29, 2018)

I lied.  I am currently in a weird mixture of Phase 2 and Phase 4.  I've been second-guessing some questions (where I didn't remember what I answered, but I'm sure I was wrong), compounded with a healthy serving of doubt due to a bunch of co-workers asking how it went.  They want me to pass way more than me, and it's def making me feel guilty that I won't do good by them!  Def need a spam thread so I can just have something to waste time with (that isn't work, DnD, or cat cafes).


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## kncumber (Oct 29, 2018)

My life has been a recurring Phase 2-5 all weekend and into today. This exam was so unorthodox. I was prepared for it if the exam came the traditional way. The way it came, stumped me immensely. Getting ready for April 2019. LETS GOOOO!!!!!


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## GeoDude_PE (Oct 29, 2018)

kncumber said:


> My life has been a recurring Phase 2-5 all weekend and into today. This exam was so unorthodox. I was prepared for it if the exam came the traditional way. The way it came, stumped me immensely. Getting ready for April 2019. LETS GOOOO!!!!!


That is a very good description... unorthodox... I studied and prepared for so long and then the exam was.. what it ended up being..


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## ZZTops (Oct 29, 2018)

Thanks for the write up. I've been lurking these forums for a while. Finally signed up. Looking forward to the friendly hazing.

BTW... Is it bad I went from totally skipping phase 1 and going straight to phase 2, and experiencing all through phase 5 in a single day? haha


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## AruT (Oct 29, 2018)

I am in Phase 2, 3, &amp; 4 - all at once. I skipped Phase 1 because taking extra stress is my favorite hobby! By November end. I will move into Phase 5 for sure!


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## RBHeadge PE (Oct 29, 2018)

@ZZTops Welcome to the forum!

@kncumber, @AruT The first few days after the exam and a roller coaster of emotions. It'll start to fit into mostly well defined phases after a few days.


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## GeoDude_PE (Oct 29, 2018)

Is there a forum post for discussing (but not talking about specific questions/answers!) about how the exam went for people?


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## RBHeadge PE (Oct 29, 2018)

SPAM is active


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## RBHeadge PE (Oct 29, 2018)

Geotech_dude said:


> Is there a forum post for discussing (but not talking about specific questions/answers!) about how the exam went for people?


There are a few active threads for specific discipline tests in the various PE Exam Prep Subforums, otherwise feel free to use this thread to talk about how things went.


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## RBHeadge PE (Oct 29, 2018)

I added the link to the spam thread in the OP, and added the suggested phase and subphase.


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## Audi Driver P.E. (Oct 29, 2018)

Ummmmm spoilers!!!!


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## RBHeadge PE (Oct 29, 2018)

Audi driver said:


> Ummmmm spoilers!!!!


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## eseket (Oct 29, 2018)

I guess i jumped straight to 4th phase or so lol. I don't know how I will survive the coming six weeks, as I already started refreshing my email for the results lol.


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## txjennah PE (Oct 29, 2018)

eseket said:


> I guess i jumped straight to 4th phase or so lol. I don't know how I will survive the coming six weeks, as I already started refreshing my email for the results lol.


Oh noooo if you've already started refreshing your results, you're in for a bad time lol. Results aren't going to be out until first week of December at the earliest.


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## eseket (Oct 29, 2018)

txjennah said:


> Oh noooo if you've already started refreshing your results, you're in for a bad time lol. Results aren't going to be out until first week of December at the earliest.


Lol true ! Man I better develop new hobbies to deflect my mind


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## txjennah PE (Oct 29, 2018)

eseket said:


> Lol true ! Man I better develop new hobbies to deflect my mind


Haha it's ok. I'm on my third attempt and waiting for the results doesn't get any easier.


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## eseket (Oct 29, 2018)

txjennah said:


> Haha it's ok. I'm on my third attempt and waiting for the results doesn't get any easier.


Good luck bro. I hope we make it!


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## txjennah PE (Oct 29, 2018)

eseket said:


> Good luck bro. I hope we make it!


Me too, thanks!


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## RichardL91 (Oct 30, 2018)

I stopped worrying about it, I just do my regular things, like continue going to school and check my emails.


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## Hockey Eng (Oct 30, 2018)

Definitely VERY Deep in the 'second guessing myself' phase.  I know there were certain questions I could have used another resource on or that I didn't adequately prepare for.  There was one resource at the last second I decided not to bring that I'm sure would have answered a question.  But given that it's my first attempt I'm sure this will eventually pass and I'm not going to lose too much sleep over it. Whatever happens, happens and at least I've got the experience under my belt in the worst case scenario that I have to take it again.


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## Dexman PE PMP (Nov 25, 2018)

Thanks for the shoutout to the classic thread!

Eventually you'll get the phase where you're a long-standing veteran and need to remember to login and say hi more than once every 2-3 months...


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## mnguy88 (Nov 27, 2018)

Are we thinking next week for results? When does someone create the Oct 2018 results topic?!


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## RBHeadge PE (Nov 27, 2018)

It won't happen before Friday. Prolly not a *horrible* idea to enter phase F5 on that day though.

Everyone will be in stage 5 towards the end of the week.


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## ME_VT_PE (Nov 27, 2018)

@hjones knows when results will be released. Just PM @hjones. If she doesn't respond, just keep trying...


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## RBHeadge PE (Nov 27, 2018)

ME_VT_PE said:


> @hjones knows when results will be released. Just PM @hjones. If she doesn't respond, just keep trying...


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## defenderred (Nov 27, 2018)

RichardL91 said:


> I stopped worrying about it, I just do my regular things, like continue going to school and check my emails.


I'm kind of in the same boat. Take care of the kids, survive the holidays, and keep cranking out projects at work. I feel like I don't really have the time to obsess over the test results, except to do a quick check on NCEES and browse here for some click bait, then back to whatever I was doing.

TBH, at this point I'm kind of meh about it. Sort of a prepare for the worst, hope for the best kind of thing.


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## Shadyplay 2015 (Nov 27, 2018)

Most of us will know PE release is critically close when the “2018 October Results” comment folder is initiated


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## Dexman PE PMP (Nov 27, 2018)

Shadyplay PE 2015 said:


> Most of us will know PE release is critically close when the “2018 October Results” comment folder is initiated


&lt;rushes off to create "2018 October Results" comment folder&gt;

:angel:


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## Therm0Joe (Nov 28, 2018)

*Phase 4 (DOUBT)* _After worrying for about a month (we're now within _2-3 _weeks of results at this point), you'll jump into full blown doubt. You are now certain that you missed way too many questions to stand a chance at passing._

_Still about here........._


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## RBHeadge PE (Nov 28, 2018)

Therm0Joe said:


> *Phase 4 (DOUBT)* _After worrying for about a month (we're now within _2-3 _weeks of results at this point), you'll jump into full blown doubt. You are now certain that you missed way too many questions to stand a chance at passing._
> 
> _Still about here........._


Give it a few more days, you'll surely hit stage 5


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## leggo PE (Nov 28, 2018)

Shadyplay PE 2015 said:


> Most of us will know PE release is critically close when the “2018 October Results” comment folder is initiated


It's here.


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## PE-2B (Nov 29, 2018)

leggo PE said:


> It's here.


Welp, my F5 button will be broken by tomorrow afternoon.


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