Please recommend a Civil/Construction review course

[Nio796]

Would any of you successful PE civil/construction Engineers recommend a review course? Any help would be appreciated. I studied really hard and put in a lot of long hour but still came up short. None of the questions were really unfamiliar but I feel I must of have really fallen for the 1st tricky incorrect answer.

Thanks in-advance for your help!

@Billyluv I passed civil construction in my first try and I did it without CERM. My method was to take the topic from the NCEES course description and then prepare my own notes and formula list. I can give you all that which can help you too. Also Texas state university has some online free courses which were helpful in morning and some PM questions.

I took all the references with me and they were helpful too. I think stay positive, and remember one thing. You can do it. Once someone told me that the moment you gather all the material you have to study, you are 50% done with passing the exam. Rest is just application.

Good luck and stay positive.

 

[AlmostPE]

Would any of you successful PE civil/construction Engineers recommend a review course? Any help would be appreciated. I studied really hard and put in a lot of long hour but still came up short. None of the questions were really unfamiliar but I feel I must of have really fallen for the 1st tricky incorrect answer.

Thanks in-advance for your help!

@Billyluv I passed civil construction in my first try and I did it without CERM. My method was to take the topic from the NCEES course description and then prepare my own notes and formula list. I can give you all that which can help you too. Also Texas state university has some online free courses which were helpful in morning and some PM questions.

I took all the references with me and they were helpful too. I think stay positive, and remember one thing. You can do it. Once someone told me that the moment you gather all the material you have to study, you are 50% done with passing the exam. Rest is just application.

Good luck and stay positive.

Nio - Do you have the link for Texas State University Free courses. Appreciate in advance!

 

[Nio796]

http://engineeringregistration.tamu.edu/downloads/MP4/index_PE.htm

Here you go... I will tell you one thing that I didn't see all of them but some just to make my concepts clear. I had other resources too which were a great help. I am compiling the whole list with my study plan and will post it after the long weekend.

 

[AlmostPE]

http://engineeringregistration.tamu.edu/downloads/MP4/index_PE.htm

Here you go... I will tell you one thing that I didn't see all of them but some just to make my concepts clear. I had other resources too which were a great help. I am compiling the whole list with my study plan and will post it after the long weekend.

Thanks a lot. Really appreciate it. Have a good holiday!

 

[CMKG]

If you search the boards you sort of see a theme when failing; lots of people think they did great or passed only to find they failed. I think this is a result of rushing the problems they are familar with or that seem easy. A person can totally understand the problem, know how to do the problem closed book, but if they forget to convert to match the units the answers give; still wrong.

I did not allow myself enough time to re-check like I wanted, but when I did quickly check I found two simple mistakes on probably the easiest questions on the test in my opinion. That could be the difference in passing or failing.

Agreed. I think I rushed through the problems that I "knew" and spent more time on things I was less comfortable with... resulting in higher scores on those subjects and being embarrassed with my results in the areas I work in every single day. Ugh.

I am with you on that. I scored 50/80 and failed. I scored exceedingly well in my weak areas and scored low on the run of the mill ones. I also agree that the Construction depth was different than what was taught in the School of PE Class. The School of PE notes came in really handy for the AM but I felt helpless in the PM.

I feel like School of PE is too easy in what problems they give you. I also feel like the water depth was not comprehensive enough. I failed still after taking exam but scored very high in some areas.

 

[IllinoisPEtaker]

School of PE was good, I highly reccommend it!

 

[billyluv]

http://engineeringregistration.tamu.edu/downloads/MP4/index_PE.htm

Here you go... I will tell you one thing that I didn't see all of them but some just to make my concepts clear. I had other resources too which were a great help. I am compiling the whole list with my study plan and will post it after the long weekend.

Thanks a lot. Really appreciate it. Have a good holiday!

That would be greatly appreciated!

 

[soniahuff]

EET is a really good review class. They have both breath and depth courses! Highly suggest to check them out http://www.eet-california.com/

Their instructors REALLY take the time to give 1:1 to each student! I just took and passed the 8-hr first time!

 

[billyluv]

EET is a really good review class. They have both breath and depth courses! Highly suggest to check them out http://www.eet-california.com/ Their instructors REALLY take the time to give 1:1 to each student! I just took and passed the 8-hr first time!

Thanks soniahuff; and thumbs up to your accomplishments.

 

[IlPadrino]

They really get you to understand the fundamentals and work out problems slightly more complex than what's on the exam, which is a good thing when the test gives you information that you previously had to solve for when studying for the exam.

Not sure what you mean by "understand the fundamentals", but I'm a Testmasters fan because they take the opposite approach: if you want to learn someone, take a college course; if you want to pass an exam; apply these strategies. Rather than explain theory, they focused on approach.

 

[billyluv]

They really get you to understand the fundamentals and work out problems slightly more complex than what's on the exam, which is a good thing when the test gives you information that you previously had to solve for when studying for the exam.

Not sure what you mean by "understand the fundamentals", but I'm a Testmasters fan because they take the opposite approach: if you want to learn someone, take a college course; if you want to pass an exam; apply these strategies. Rather than explain theory, they focused on approach.

Thanks for the recommendation. I'll check them out. I like the approach.

 

[calidude2000]

If taking the construction portion I would recommend going to LearnCivilEngineering.com. I used it the second time I took it and following the guide. I would really look at the example questions posted and getting NCEES practice exams. Good Luck!

 

[Nio796]

If taking the construction portion I would recommend going to LearnCivilEngineering.com.  I used it the second time I took it and following the guide.  I would really look at the example questions posted and getting NCEES practice exams.  Good Luck!

I will confirm that. I passed construction in my first attempt and did 100% what learncivilengineering told me. They have nice study plan and good examples.

After that I checked CERM and it was hard. Took the exam and it was more like examples I did from LCE than CERM.

 

[billyluv]

If taking the construction portion I would recommend going to LearnCivilEngineering.com. I used it the second time I took it and following the guide. I would really look at the example questions posted and getting NCEES practice exams. Good Luck!

I will confirm that. I passed construction in my first attempt and did 100% what learncivilengineering told me. They have nice study plan and good examples.

After that I checked CERM and it was hard. Took the exam and it was more like examples I did from LCE than CERM.

I've been looking at their site. I like it. Although I'm having a little difficulty navigating through the site. Thanks for the help. I too think CERM is too hard.

 

[billyluv]

If taking the construction portion I would recommend going to LearnCivilEngineering.com. I used it the second time I took it and following the guide. I would really look at the example questions posted and getting NCEES practice exams. Good Luck!

Thanks

 

[desantmf]

Billyluv, I am almost done with a site redesign. So in a couple of weeks it should be a lot more user friendly. Let me know if you have any questions.

 

[billyluv]

Billyluv, I am almost done with a site redesign. So in a couple of weeks it should be a lot more user friendly. Let me know if you have any questions.

Thanks! I'm getting serious and dedicated to studying again after the Holiday. I like the way you explain, in detail, how the answers to the questions were calculated.

 

[Stealtharsenal_PE]

Billy,

While I didn't take construction, I passed by using a combination of the CERM, NCEES Exams (2004, 2008 and 2011) and Goswami All in One Sample Exams. While I took Water as my PM section, I purchased the contruction and geotechnical 2011 NCEES exams just to make sure I covered all my bases when it came to those particular subjects. I did find overlapping questions between material sets that might be helpful in your preparation. I personally found that working the difficult problems from say the CERM Sample Exam helped with the much easier problems that showed up in retired NCEES problems. This is my personal experience and may differ from individual to individual.

 

[billyluv]

Billy,

While I didn't take construction, I passed by using a combination of the CERM, NCEES Exams (2004, 2008 and 2011) and Goswami All in One Sample Exams. While I took Water as my PM section, I purchased the contruction and geotechnical 2011 NCEES exams just to make sure I covered all my bases when it came to those particular subjects. I did find overlapping questions between material sets that might be helpful in your preparation. I personally found that working the difficult problems from say the CERM Sample Exam helped with the much easier problems that showed up in retired NCEES problems. This is my personal experience and may differ from individual to individual.

Thanks Stealtharsenal PE

 

[power plantin]

They really get you to understand the fundamentals and work out problems slightly more complex than what's on the exam, which is a good thing when the test gives you information that you previously had to solve for when studying for the exam.

Not sure what you mean by "understand the fundamentals", but I'm a Testmasters fan because they take the opposite approach: if you want to learn someone, take a college course; if you want to pass an exam; apply these strategies. Rather than explain theory, they focused on approach.

Thanks for the recommendation. I'll check them out. I like the approach.

Spot on. I knew 2 people who could of passed it, but didn't. They had no test strategy.

There are easy questions, but you need to read the question well. You need to manage your time, pass hard question or ones that gave you problems in the past.

This is a test of some fundamental topics, not every nook and cranny in the business.

I'm sure the exam makers put some questions in to suck your time down.

Going back to the fail guys. They were a bit iffy on the subject matter. However, they just plowed through the test, 1 then 2 then 3 then....... times up.

Instread of struggling with those last few hard questions, go back and check your work on the easy ones. Not redo the problems. Figure out a method that assures a quality answer in another way than basically solving it. Is the answer in PSI, yes. Does the equations you used match up to the original question asked?

You have to correctly answer 70% of the questions. Focus on the 70% you know well. The other 30% are buffer questions.

The breadth questions I studied were close to the afternoon questions. So, don't sweat the oddball questions. Knock down the ones the reoccur in practice exams.

Do live tests. 4 hours of straight concentration. I never did so much math work in one day before studying or taking this test. Just like real world. Focus on what you know, then work on what you don't know. And like in the real world, you can't do it all yourself. You however can do a big chunk. Proficiency is not perfection.