AEI SE Lectures

[Just_SE]

Hi all,

This is my first post. I just pass my SE exam in this Oct test, and saw many people ask about what lectures to take. I would like to highly recommend the AEI (Advanced Engineering Institute) SE lectures and share my experience here. Hope it will be helpful.

I have three years experience on building design and one year experience on telecommunication tower analysis. I passed PE exam in Oct 2018 with taking EET Civil Breadth and Structural Depth (Now AEI). I took both SE Vertical and Lateral (Building) exams in April 2019 with taking EET SE Vertical and Lateral lectures (Now all SE lectures change to AEI). I passed the Vertical with my first trial and failed the Lateral (27/40, A, A, IR, U). I did my second trial on Lateral in Oct 2019 and made a pass. I am living in North Carolina, and high seismic design is not something I did in my daily work. So their lectures really helped me a lot. 

I would like to give a 5 star rating on AEI SE lectures and PE (structural) lectures. Their handouts are really detailed and helpful. They divide their handouts to chapters (concrete, steel, wood, masonry, seismic, wind, bridge, foundation, etc). And they have summary sheets for each chapter which contains important requirements and equations. Besides, they provide homework practice problems and mini-exams for each chapter, as well as a simulated practice exam two weeks before the exam date. Dr. Ibrahim and Dr. Zayati are really professional and responsive. I can email them questions at any time and usually get their answers on the next day. I even got their reply when they were overseas. I worked on lateral preparation for about one month for my April exam, which is not enough and I even did not finish all their lectures. But I still got a very close grade. AEI provide free one-time repeat if did not pass for the first attempt, and I can get full access to all the old and new lectures with their detailed explanation on any questions I had. After completing the repeat lectures and all their practice exams. I was very confident for the exam. I only took their handouts and the required codes to the exam, without any other references. Their practice problems are really close to the level of the real exam questions, and the summary sheet can help you get the answer as soon as you can. 

I hope this will help if you are looking to take PE-structural or SE exam and looking for a class. Follow their lectures and work on their practices, you will find that the exam is not that hard to pass!

If you want to know more information, here is their website https://www.aei-california.com. Feel free to let me know if their is anything I can help you with. I know how it feels when I know I am passing, and I would like to share the happiness with you all. Hope everyone can get an acceptable on their next exam. Best wishes. 

 

[leggo PE]

Thanks for the review, and congrats on passing the SE exam!

 

[JP87]

Signed up for both Vertical and Lateral classes for the April 2020 SE. Round 2 

 

[Just_SE]

Signed up for both Vertical and Lateral classes for the April 2020 SE. Round 2 

Good luck. Their classes are really helpful. Focus on their handouts and follow their classes and suggestions, you should be good. Good luck!

 

[thedaywa1ker]

Signed up for the vertical class...self studied (barely) for it back in 2018, didn't go so well.  I'm going for the class after seeing the 18% pass rate for retakers.

Do we know when the webinars and notes/etc are going to be made available?  I don't see anything about a start date in the class dashboard

 

[Just_SE]

Signed up for the vertical class...self studied (barely) for it back in 2018, didn't go so well.  I'm going for the class after seeing the 18% pass rate for retakers.

Do we know when the webinars and notes/etc are going to be made available?  I don't see anything about a start date in the class dashboard

On their website, click on the "Classes" tab and find the "SE Vertical Forces", under the "Show Live Webinar Info & Schedule", you will see that the first class starts on Jan 12 (Sunday).

If you enrolled the "On-Demand" class, you will have immediate access to the recorded lectures for the Oct 2019 class, as long as your account is approved. You will also have access to the new lectures of the lived class after they upload weekly. 

Hope this will help. Good luck for the exam.

 

[davab]

Just_SE, did you say you only took the AEI's binder for the SE test? I am glad that was enough. I am having issues being more familiar with some stuff in the code instead of the AEI study prep. 

Maybe I should focus more on being more familiar with the binders and not waste time on the code references.

 

[Just_SE]

Just_SE, did you say you only took the AEI's binder for the SE test? I am glad that was enough. I am having issues being more familiar with some stuff in the code instead of the AEI study prep. 

Maybe I should focus more on being more familiar with the binders and not waste time on the code references.

I cannot say that AEI's binder covers 100% of the test every time. But based on my experience (one vertical and twice lateral), it covers more than 90% of the test every time. So my suggestion is focusing on the binder first. It will help you at least get a good score, and do your best engineering judgement on the rest. I think this should be enough to pass the test. If you feel confident on the binders and still have time, you can absolutely search code references, which will increase the chance passing the test. Hope it helps. Good luck.

 

[ZEZO4]

I registered EET (now AEI) and passed the SE exam on October 2018, it is worth, I highly recommend it with Dr. Ahmed and Dr. Zayati. 

 

[davab]

I have three years experience on building design and one year experience on telecommunication tower analysis. I passed PE exam in Oct 2018 with taking EET Civil Breadth and Structural Depth (Now AEI).

If you don't mind me asking, what was your level of experience in the materials? I.E. wood, masonry, steel, concrete, bridge?

And how many hours did you devote to studying each exam per week?

 

[Just_SE]

If you don't mind me asking, what was your level of experience in the materials? I.E. wood, masonry, steel, concrete, bridge?

And how many hours did you devote to studying each exam per week?

My majority work is about steel and concrete. I also worked on wood a little bit and with almost zero experience on masonry. But as you know, people do not do hand calculation in the daily work. So the experience can only give you limited help unless you read the codes very carefully and did a lot of hand calcs in your work. To be honest, I never used the tables in AISC manual in my daily work. I worked on bridges for about 5 months. And it does not help with my exam at all. 

So I was focusing on AEI lectures after work. I cannot say how many hours for studying. It took me about 4 weeks (Feb. 1st to Feb. 28, 2019) for the vertical exam. That means 100% focusing on it. I spent every hour I can on this. From March 1st, I started the lateral preparation. The exam date was April 05, so I did not have enough time for lateral. I passed the vertical but fail the lateral in the April exam. In my opinion, the vertical exam is easier than lateral, and the AEI PE classes cover some chapters of the SE vertical test. 

I retake the AEI class in August and spent about 2 or 3 hours on the lateral exam for the work days. I need to take care of my kids on Saturday, and could study about 4 or 5 hours on Sunday. It took my about two months to finish the lateral preparation.

Hope this helps. Best luck!

 

[davab]

27/40, A, A, IR, U

What does this mean? A A IR U?

 

[Just_SE]

What does this mean? A A IR U?

In the morning test, you will get 40 multi-choice questions, and I made 27 right. So that is 27/40. To pass the morning test, you need to make at least 28. 

In the afternoon test, you will get 4 questions if you take the building (3 questions for bridge). NCEES will grade your answer as A, IR or U. "A" is "Acceptable". "IR" is "Improvement Required". "U" is "Unacceptable". Anytime, you will fail the exam if you get "U" for any question. I think you will still pass the exam if you get one "A" with "IR" for others. NCEES does not give clear details on the passing score for the afternoon test. There are lots of discussion about it in the forum. 

Hope this helps. Please let me know if you have other questions. 

 

[d.krausz]

Signed up for both Vertical and Lateral classes for the April 2020 SE. Round 2

I am going to sign up for both the vertical and lateral classes for April 2022 exams. Was it really difficult to take both classes at the same time ? Roughly 12 hours per week...
Also, did you need to study a lot outside of the classwork? Thanks!

 

[d.krausz]

Signed up for both Vertical and Lateral classes for the April 2020 SE. Round 2

Hello! Wondering how this went taking both classes at once? I am going to sign up to take both the Vertical and Lateral classes for April 2022 exams (taking both). Was it so crazy to take both classes at once? Looks like 12 hours per week roughly. Also, did you find yourself studying a lot outside of the class time? Thanks!

 

[psustruct]

I took ONLY the Lateral, but some say taking both is brutal. That being said, it really comes down to how much you need to learn. If you are weak on alot of areas, you may require homework outside of the provided binder. The binder has many homework and workshop problems. They also provide mini-exams along the way, and a practice exam near the end.

The information they provide in the course is many levels above PPI, ASCE, and School of PE. Both in depth and quantity.

 

[TheLostDesigner]

Hello! Wondering how this went taking both classes at once? I am going to sign up to take both the Vertical and Lateral classes for April 2022 exams (taking both). Was it so crazy to take both classes at once? Looks like 12 hours per week roughly. Also, did you find yourself studying a lot outside of the class time? Thanks!

I took both classes and tests for the '21 April exam. I easily spent 30+ hours a week between the lectures and doing practice problems (the classes give a lot of good "homework" and practice quizzes). Between the two courses (on top of a 40-50 hr work week) I was not able to keep up, I went into the exam without having done any practice problems or quizzes for the lateral concrete and lateral bridge sections (watched the lectures only). I passed the gravity exam, but I'm taking the lateral exam again in a few weeks, taking advantage of the free course retake.
I loved the courses and would recommend them to anyone. I would caution anyone attempting to do both at once while also working full time, it is a huge commitment.

 

[DoctorWho-PE]

Each class is an 8ish hour weekend day, plus about 2 1/2 hour weeknight, plus hw/quiz time, so really is more like 15-20 hours, PER CLASS. It is hard. I did not keep up.

 

[Be-n]

I successfully did vertical class for April 2021 and currently in the lateral class for Oct 2021.
I don’t know how this is even doable to do both classes and keep up with all lectures and practice problems while you also work full time and, most likely, have a family.
This cycle we had to have extra lateral class on Wednesdays with Dr. Ibrahim just to take care of all additional material that came with the code updates. So in the first half of the class, we had about 12-13 hours of lectures per week. Then you need to get somewhat familiar with the codes, tab your materials, and solve homework’s and mini exams… that can easily be 20-25 hours per class. That barely fitted into my life. Two classes would be just not possible for me unless I could take one month off from work before the exam.

 

[leggo PE]

I took both classes for the April 2021 test cycle, and did not end up passing either exam. This is NOT a reflection of the classes at all; more like the others said, I couldn’t sustain the pace of both classes and all the work needed to feel properly prepared for both exams. I didn’t retake the exams this cycle, but when I do, I will only take one class at a time, of that I am sure. I cannot handle working 45+ hour weeks and do both classes, and keep up with everything by the end. I majorly skipped out on concrete and AASHTO by the end as well, which was much to my detriment.

Also, while both teachers are extremely supportive, when I talked with Dr. Ahmed after signing up for both classes, he honestly shared with me that he would have advised me to take just the vertical class first.

So, there’s my two cents!