2022 Post CBT Exam Wait Period - Welcome to the Suck

[steel]

Welcome to the 2022 PE post-CBT exam wait period. This is it: the final Suck. Though it will be considerably shorter thanks to the conversion of the exams to computer-based testing (CBT), the 7-10 days after the exam are still considered a gigantic suck.* You’ll go through phases over the next week or so. And honestly, can we really expect everything to go smoothly? This is NCEES we’re talking about. There may be some of you that wait 14 days for your results. You cannot convince me that there won’t be any hiccups.

*Of course SE-candidates will still have the REAL suck. The one where they have to wait weeks for their results for another couple years. But they've already gone through the PE process and they make the big bucks so they can deal with it.

A few years ago @Dexman PE PMP wrote a famous post (Feel good about how you did on the exam?) outlining the stages of the post-exam emotional roller-coaster. And of course, @RBHeadge PE took this to a whole new level with the P&P Welcome to the Suck threads, so I’d be remiss if I didn’t recognize his efforts. I’ve reproduced their immortal words (italics) with some slight modifications to condense the suck from 7 weeks to 7 days.

Phase 0 (Emotional Hangover) This happens immediately after the conclusion of the exam. You spend the next few days day 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 (pro tip: spam thread here, spend time with family and friends, 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 most of the first day following the exam. You may still be recovering from the mental marathon of the exam or the post-exam binge fest. 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 on day 2. You will start to forget small (but important) pieces of the exam and forget how you answered the question, but you will remember just enough 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 on either day 3 or 4. 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 several days (we're now within 3-4 days 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 **** long to grade a simple scantron digital test 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 **** again" and "Don't try to calc it because it's worthless" responses to all of your cut-score and release date posts. I mean, really, 7-10 days to report results that probably could have been shown to you ON THE SCREEN the day of the exam?!?!? We’re millennials and Gen Zers, we NEED instant gratification!

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.

 

[steel]

Then there are obsessive futile “exercises” waiting examinees engage in. These can happen anytime during phases 2, 3, 4, and 5. The order of the exercise is arbitrary.

Futile Exercise 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 (nope).

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. 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.


Futile Exercise 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 “7-10 days” 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 third-party websites like PCS and CTS 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.

Oh, and don’t fall for the “try to register for the next exam” trick. It’s not a valid way to determine if you passed or failed. Now that you know about it, I have ZERO pity for you if you still fall for this it!

And BTW, getting mailers for PE study courses and/or PDH courses isn’t a sign that you failed or passed either. Nor is getting an invitation to join ASCE or NSPE. It simply means that you’re on someone’s mailing list.


I’ve left this below section in for posterity, but let me tell you, although it will be easier to guess the release date (duh, with a smaller release timeframe), it’s still futile. You have no idea when they’re releasing anything until it has happened. So just stop trying, otherwise you’ll be saying “today is the today” for a week and even you’ll get tired of hearing that.



Futile Exercise 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 year’s results 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.

PE Release History

I started to make a spreadsheet of the release dates. While going to previous maps for the dates, I got to the April 2014 forum and found out someone else has done the same thing. I have a much more simpler spreadsheet than the one previously posted in the forum below...

engineerboards.com

But be warned, scratching an itch usually makes it worse.

Futile Exercise D (reading the tea leaves) This is a variation on futile exercises 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.

Futile Exercise E (harassing NCEES and state board employees) The title says it all, it's an aggravated version of futile exercise B. Don't be a dick. Harassing NCEES so badly that they shut down the online chat function is not an accomplishment to be proud of. You aren't doing yourself any favors by acting unprofessional.

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

You may be tempted to continuously reload the dashboard after about 4-5 days. It’s a mediocre way to burn off stress, and a great way to waste internet bandwidth and possibly break your F5 button; but it won’t get you your results before the initial release email goes out.

But after the initial release, we can confirm that sometimes the examinees dashboard will update with the results prior to the NCESS email going out. The time difference is anywhere from no-delay to a couple hours. So, after the initial release you can go ahead and spam F5 to relieve the jitters.

 

[steel]

Feel free to use this thread to ask questions about the process or nonviolently rant about it. But in the interest of your sanity (and the happiness and security of your friends, family, and co-workers) try not dwell too much on the exam. Spend time with friends and family, burn off stress at the gym, find a hobby, or better yet spend some time on the game threads; especially the spam thread. It’s a well-known fact that NCEES won’t release the results until the thread reaches 15k, so start spammin’!

Ongoing CBT Exam Spam Thread 2022

Back by popular demand. This is our the new EB.com spam fest to help with the post-exam stresses for the Weekly WttS. For the noobs, the goal is to focus less on the exam, how you did or did not do or the results, and more on unwinding here in the STB subforum and getting this thread to...

engineerboards.com

Oh, and we could really use some new blood in the EB Mafia game.

EB Mafia

Looking to see if there would be any interest in starting up an EB Mafia game? For those who haven’t heard of it, you basically have a few players who are secretly members of the mafia, and they try to eliminate all the other players before being discovered. RULES: Welcome to EB Mafia! Below...

engineerboards.com

The vets have all experienced this firsthand, sometimes more than once, and we know how much it sucks. And some of us will tease you about it too. It was done to us to help break the tension and we’re carrying on the tradition. There is nothing personal meant or implied in the teases, and we hope you’ll all stick around to aid, distract, and tease the next group.

Good luck, and we all look forward to meeting many new interesting engineers and hope you all stick around to see what a fun and entertaining group we can actually be.

With that said, how did the exam go last week?