October 2018

[Med610]

How do you guys feel about morning session? 

Easy/moderate/difficult?

 

[txjennah PE]

The entire test sucked.

 

[Med610]

Which one did you take? Transpo? Or structures? 

 

[leggo PE]

All would have the same morning section...

 

[txjennah PE]

Which one did you take? Transpo? Or structures? 

I should have clarified, I'm enviro so I don't take the breadth portion like you all do.  If I am already struggling to pass an exam with 4-5 subjects, no way I can remember another 5-6 more from like 15 years ago...

 

[CanadianRebel]

I thought the morning section was much harder than the NCEES Practice Exam.  I studied for about a month or so for the morning section before taking the Practice Exam.  Based on my results for that practice test, I decided to spend the last 2 months on the afternoon section because I thought I could just look what I didn't know up in the CERM and be fine.  The actual morning section had questions that I'm pretty sure weren't even in the CERM.  I remember finding information on one question in a college textbook I randomly decided to bring with me, but unfortunately I didn't have the time to learn how to do it.  Even if I had put more study time into the morning section, I never would have even thought to cover that topic.  There were more questions than I would have preferred that left me similarly frustrated.  It's crazy to me how few questions I actually remember though.  I cannot remember many easy questions, but hopefully it has something to do with time spent beating my head against the desk!

 

[knight1fox3]

EE - Power. "You sunk my battleship."

Preparation Time/Materials: 250 total hours. 5 textbooks, prep coursework notebook, 2 notebooks of graduate class material, calculators, snacks, rolling suitcase.

Money: ~$1,550.

General Observations: Arrived at my site 30 minutes prior to report time. Noticed that many others had literally libraries and libraries of books. Someone had a giant wagon with bungie cords holding all of the books together. Others just had a single piece of paper. Wild. I randomly started thinking of a national geographic special with narration by Morgan Freeman on PE test taking habits. I needed that laugh to clear my head.

AM Session: Felt the AM session was great. Only ended up with 6-7 that I didn't have a single solid answer or couldn't find it in my reference. I finished slightly early and checked only some of my work.

PM Session: Total unadulterated bloodbath. Couldn't seem to concentrate enough to find the equations I needed. Calculator was spitting out answers that were out of this world. Saw stuff that I barely covered in droves. About 2-3 hours into the afternoon, my brain felt like it had been through a dishwasher and I started hopping around from question to question. Not good. I will be lucky if I got a quarter to half right. I might as well have taken another discipline in the afternoon or gone to work. A monkey may have been able to do better.

Final Thoughts: As I left the exam area, I felt numb, dumb, and a little crushed. I felt like I blew the morning session out of the water. Then the PE got off a torpedo as I was heading to collect my stamp, promotion, and better life. I'm not very good at guessing and doing the math in my head all weekend I kept envisioning a percentage score in the upper 60s with an afternoon diagnostic that simply says "monkey". 6 months of neglecting my wife and family might be for nothing in the end except doing it all over again. I know the pass rate for repeaters is low, but what is the divorce rate?

Oh well. If I recall from a coworker, last years results were released in around 45-50 days following the exam. I think he got his in late May. We shall see. I guess the ultimate decision is now do I crack open another book....or another beer?

 

[LyceeFruit PE]

All would have the same morning section...

No. Why would my Power AM be identical to a Transpo AM?

 

[mnguy88]

I thought the morning section was much harder than the NCEES Practice Exam.  I studied for about a month or so for the morning section before taking the Practice Exam.  Based on my results for that practice test, I decided to spend the last 2 months on the afternoon section because I thought I could just look what I didn't know up in the CERM and be fine.  The actual morning section had questions that I'm pretty sure weren't even in the CERM.  I remember finding information on one question in a college textbook I randomly decided to bring with me, but unfortunately I didn't have the time to learn how to do it.  Even if I had put more study time into the morning section, I never would have even thought to cover that topic.  There were more questions than I would have preferred that left me similarly frustrated.  It's crazy to me how few questions I actually remember though.  I cannot remember many easy questions, but hopefully it has something to do with time spent beating my head against the desk!

I felt the same for the morning. I took civil construction. This was my fourth time doing civil but first time doing construction depth. This was one of the hardest morning sections. I figured it’d be harder because last cycle was very straight forward and as easy or easier than the ncees practice exam. I’m hoping for a miracle. The morning threw me off. Having done this four times, you can study all you want but ncees can still throw whatever at you and material you may never have thought of to look over.

 

[RBHeadge PE]

No. Why would my Power AM be identical to a Transpo AM?

Because NCEES wants people to have to pay to retake the test again.

#sarcasm

 

[USC_Engineer PE]

I thought the AM portion was much easier this time around than it was in April 2018. I used School of PE for the AM portion, their notes had almost everything covered. Anything the School of PE didn't cover I found pretty easily in the CERM. 

 

[leggo PE]

No. Why would my Power AM be identical to a Transpo AM?

True, true. Sorry, I was just thinking about the civil AM. Which apparently isn't even the same for enviro's, which I knew, so I'll just shut up and go away from this thread.