I felt competent before the exam but with my result I am not sure, I think that in a professional setting I would be able to successfully execute the material on the exam but having only worked for one firm I guess I can't confidently believe that either.
In the morning I used the AEI method of ranking problems 1-3 according to perceived difficulty and working them easiest to hardest. There were a few 3's in the morning I didn't manage to find a solution to but I walked away I feeling I did much better than a 22/40. In the afternoon the general analysis threw me but I was hoping for an IR which I did not get, I thought the concrete problem was 'wonky' and felt very poorly about it but ended up with an A. The other two I felt ok about but got an IR and a U.
I didn't feel good about vertical when I passed it so I think I'm a bad judge of my own test performance. I would very much appreciate help and will take you up on it thank you.
Duke....Let me sing you the song of my people haha...I feel for you 100%. This test has a way of being an exquisite form of psychological torture. The way I see it, there are 5 main components or areas of this test that are crucial:
1. Studying--you have to know the material, in general. This is the "easy" part for lateral. Go through the code.
2. Practice--working problems. The current body of work involves NCEES (generally not useful for afternoon), PPI (slightly more useful for afternoon), and AEI (very useful for morning, afternoon, and everything in between).
3. Timing--When we envision the test, the thing that might surprise test takers most is just the time crunch. It's obscene. Given 15 more minutes on every afternoon problem, I surmise pass rates would improve significantly. I almost feel that if you work NCEES/PPI/AEI essay problems (and have done them before) you should be able to complete them in 40 minutes or less. This is because, just from a test writing standpoint, NCEES is very unlikely to write a test that includes a lateral problem from the NCEES/PPI lateral exams.
4. Completeness--Can't emphasize this enough, don't miss/skip steps that make it seem like you don't know what you're doing. Imagine a scenario where you need to find "Cs". If you calculate it using one equation and "forget" to check max and min values, it appears like you don't have the knowledge about that subject. It's
very easy to skip steps with the time crunch issue. When you're rushing through an essay problem you haven't seen before, that's when these things happen. It's also easier to hide knowledge deficiencies in the morning because they are multiple choice. In the afternoon, not so much. Notice the way the NCEES practice exam is worded...they will ask you a question, but there sort of hidden requirements inside that simple statement. Note lateral problem 804b. It asks for "all nailing requirements for sheathing and framing of a shear wall." When I work this problem, I sometimes just check the shear wall nailing at the edges and boundaries, and completely skip the top and bottom plate nailing requirements. If you specifically asked me for the bottom plate nailing requirements, I would do it...but the wording of the problem obscures some of the things you need to put so your answer is complete.
5. Procedure--Choosing the wrong procedure for a problem torpedoes your essay problem and subsequently your entire test. If you get 40/40 on the morning, and acceptable on 3 essay problems, then select the wrong procedure for a wind/seismic problem...you're almost guaranteed to fail.
Hopefully this helps...both of us.
