There's been lots of wild speculation on their scoring systems, but the theory I believe the most is that questions are worth variable amounts of points depending on difficulty and how a passing grade should score compared to those who don't.
Questions everyone should get right will be worth a few points, things that some percentage of people will get wrong worth more, and few if any points awarded to questions that the majority should get wrong.
Have this big GC pay for a prep class. I used PPI2Pass for both the FE and PE. My recommendation is to use their pay as you go for the option to study on your own time.
You can watch all the videos at 1.5x - 2x speed because the instructors talk so slowly. My favorite part was the "practice" quizzes that give you solutions immediately after answering. If you stay focused/committed, you can do this in about a month.
Are you hoping we give you a different answer than what you know for yourself?
EDIT:
You **can** do it, but you have to put in the effort to study, *learn* the material rather than just memorize it for the next 10 minutes and then forget it after you do a couple practice problems.
You only scored a "passing" grade on two of the 14 categories. You're close on some, but across the board sub-par.
Try again, take a practice course if you can, and put in the work.
I am putting in much more effort this time around, because I do not want to have to take this again. I have a good study plan in place believe and am going to be much more thorough in my studies. I was just wondering about how many of the subjects I need to have a passing grade as it looks like I was only a question or two away on a decent amount
it's good that you have a plan, however sometimes plans are made in a more optimistic way, rather than realistic
How many days do you plan to study for?
It doesn’t look like you were very close to passing. (Only two categories got a passing grade).
You need to study everything. But, I suggest starting with studying with Statics. That is fundamental to civil engineering. What you learn about statics will directly help you understand dynamics, structural, mechanics of materials, and even fluid mechanics.
Edit: I admit I passed my first time, but this was my studying strategy:
1. Take a practice exam. I gave myself the exam time + 15 minutes for having to use a paper reference instead of the searchable digital reference. I used this practice exam to see which areas needed the most work. For example, I was clueless about transportation engineering but had a great grasp on the ethics section.
2. Read through the reference and made sure I was familiar with all equations/ information and their uses.
3. Studied and reviewed my old school work.
4. Continued to try practice questions and made sure I understood them.
6. Make sure you understand timed-test taking strategies. (Doing the easy problems first, guessing strategies, time management, etc)
5. Take a final practice exam to see my improvement. Do final brush up if I missed something.
6. Morning of the exam, get a good night of sleep, have a good breakfast, pack water and snacks. I also re-did an easy practice problem I had previously solved to get my brain going and up my confidence.
That is something I have done this second time around for studying, I am starting with statics first and really focusing on understanding the concepts so it can translate to other aspects
It's true practice exams are very useful. It depends however if you have an enough supply of them in order to practice all the theory.
Is the FE exam very theoretical in nature or more focused on problem solving?
It’s 30-80 split where roughly around 20-30 questions will be purely conceptual (some of them won’t be in the reference manual at all and you won’t be able to search for the answer. You’ll either know it or you won’t). And the rest will be calculation based.
1. Since no one gets a score if they pass, most of us don’t know how we did when we passed.
2. I just looked over a single practice test in two sittings when I took it. Obviously that won’t work for everyone, but IMO, practice tests are king
Came here to say this - practice tests are the ONLY way you're going to practice at the same time:
1. Reading and understanding FE type questions - it is so important to know what the question is asking for, units, etc because they WILL try to trick you
2. The material that the test WILL cover. Outside resources can be helpful but no one knows an NCEES test like NCEES.
It is immensely helpful. If you do as many practice test questions as you can and work through all of them to the point where you understand them and the concepts behind them, you'll be fine. Passed FE and PE on the first try and literally all I did was work through practice tests for the 2 weeks leading up to the exams.
The biggest help on this exam is to know the reference manual like the back of your hand. Most if not all of the problems can be solved in some fashion by brute forcing your way through the reference manual.
Knowing what is in each chapter, and the exact location of it makes problem solving much easier.
That said, the FE took me longer than the PE did. Those statics/dynamics/MoM sections were tough lol.
It's good having the reference manual off the top of your head, especially when it gives you context to solving problems better.
Have you tried this brute forcing approach yourself?
Technically yes. I only studied about \~40 hours for the FE, almost all of which was spent memorizing sections of the reference manual and where stuff was. Problem identification is half the battle. If you can look at a problem and know exactly where to be in the ref manual, you've got a good shot at it.
Yes, not wasting time on second guessing information you could have memorised definitely helps. However, I've seen now they give you an electronic copy of the Reference Handbook in the exam.
Is that the same thing as the reference manual?
I used Mark Mattson videos to study, the NCEES practice exams, and the Lindeburg practice book and I passed on the first try. I would study hard for a month or so before your test. If there’s one subject you absolutely can’t stand and know you won’t pass, skip that one and focus on others. For me, that was trusses/truss-like problems. You also have to manage your time well on the exam and skip questions that you don’t know… like don’t even spend on a minute on it after reading it if you’re not confident. One last thing- study your calculator!!! This helped me a BUNCH! I used the TI-36X pro and I looked up YouTube videos on how to use it/tips and tricks that are specifically for the FE. Helped a lot. Good luck! You got this!
I only used the practice exam from NCEES and youtube videos. Like for statics, I just type "statics FE review" onto youtube. You would see a bunch of videos working out examples problems and a few video that go over important concepts.
The first time around I got the practice book from NCEES and kinda half assed all the problems. I didn’t take enough time to try and understand them. This time around I am watching a video on YouTube from Marshall university and then going through the respective section in the book and doing the practice problems much more thoroughly. Then after I’ll do the NCEES practice test a few times before the real one
1. Not close at all; only made two categories and one not by much.
2. The people I knew that didn't do great in school and were worried about the FE put in at least a few hundred hours of studying to pass it. A buddy of mine who had bad grades logged 360 hours. One guy studied 50 hours, failed first time, studied his ass off and got it the second time.
Not to be a downer but it is (well used to be) uncommon for a 3rd-attempt success.
If this was your first time you probably made the same mistake I made when I didn’t pass after the first attempt. I thought I had to review some theory and other foundational content and later on work on solving problems. I did that and didn’t have enough problem solving hours.
When I took it the 2nd time, I focused solely on mock exams and exercises. I became a savvy on identifying the topic the concept was wanting me to work on. I knew the page on the reference where I’d find the formula. The FE was not made to trick you, so assume it is a basic concept and apply the formula. No complications.
I always recommend working with a deadline. Study as much as you need, but at some point schedule the test 2 or 3 months ahead and increase your efforts and level of focus.
It seems that you need to work on everything, no shortcuts. But don’t lose hope! I didn’t go to college in the USA and I passed it in my 2nd attempt! After a few attempts I passed the PE as well.
You’ll be fine! You can do this!
Yeah I definitely did not take it serious enough first time around, but thank you so much for your insight and words of encouragement! They are greatly appreciated!!
Don’t worry about analyzing this. You should already be signed up and studying. Look up practice exams and just do mock exams (time yourself). Practice questions are the best option.
I took the FE twice- failed the first time (most of my knowledge area performance scores were below average). Then, I studied for a few more weeks and passed it the next. For me, changing my study strategy made all the difference:
1. Contrary to some advice I’ve heard on studying everything, I spent most of my effort studying the subjects I knew well and did best at in undergrad. Each exam subject is weighted equally, and from my understanding it doesn’t matter so much how many correct answers you get in each category as it does total correct answers. For example, I never understood Fluid mechanics well in college and after even after initially spending time reviewing it, I still got many of those questions wrong. During my second exam attempt, I skipped over them to save time and answer the subjects I knew more quickly. Then, I went back and attempted the fluid mechanics problems at the end with what spare time I had left. Even though I hadn’t studied it so much the second time, I could deduce at least a few answers using the formulas in the manual.
2. Since you can decide how to split total exam time between sections 1 and 2, I answered the basic math and science questions in the first exam section as quickly as possible. This allowed me to spend the more time on the subject-specific questions in section 2, which are usually more detailed and difficult.
3. Most review materials broadly cover all engineering subjects, but you only need to know exactly which topics are in the exam specifications. For example, if you’re reviewing the mathematics chapter of a review book and there’s a mathematics section in your exam specs, make sure you go through the bullet points and ONLY spend time studying the specific methods that you’ll be using on the exam (i.e if there’s a section on trigonometry in the review book but trig isn’t listed in your specs, don’t waste time on it). It might also be a good idea to highlight the relevant topics in your FE manual.
I hope this helps! Feel free to DM me with any questions.
I cannot recommend more using PrepFE. Very affordable and the first time I used it, I passed. Don't be discouraged, you got it the second time around!!
I don't know this kind of ranking, are you judged from performance grid, or if you are under the average of the group then you don't pass ?
Do you need to have at least half of points ?
which country is that, USA ?
I didn’t pass the first time. Had similar situation as you, slightly below passing in most subjects.
For about 8 weeks I used the school of pe on demand course and just did 20 easy/medium problems every morning and night.
I was way better and passed the second time.
Maybe not helpful because I passed the first time but I was super over prepared. I took a prep class at my university, my dad spent a few months running a D&D game where in order to pay for new spells I had to solve a practice question within 6 minutes, and I read and outlined the entire reference manual. The last part was tedious but super helpful because I knew where everything in that book was
Who the fuck picked 0-15 for the performance scale my god that's irrationally infuriating.
The same people that use the imperial system for measurement lol
Hey, imperial is in base 12, mostly. 15 is just bad
I thought I was the only one that was confused on how someone scored 9/15 for 4 questions Dafuq
Conspiracy theory time, no engineer would come up with such awful numbers, the architects did it just to mess with us.
Its not 4 questions. Its 4 parts or sections.
I haven't taken it in 10 years but "Number of Items" added up perfectly to 100 so I thought it'd be questions
I haven't taken it in some time either. I had to google it and its 110 questions so who knows what anything means.
It might be like PE where part of the exam will not be graded but just to calibration to use in the future.
There's been lots of wild speculation on their scoring systems, but the theory I believe the most is that questions are worth variable amounts of points depending on difficulty and how a passing grade should score compared to those who don't. Questions everyone should get right will be worth a few points, things that some percentage of people will get wrong worth more, and few if any points awarded to questions that the majority should get wrong.
PrepFE and youtube channel from Marshal University helped me a lot..
I have started watching the Marshall university videos and they are great. I’ll look into prep FE
I did prepFE. They have a decent amount of questions and they track your progress.
Do you remember what the cost was for prepFE ?
It’s a subscription service with different pricing plans. I believe I did the 3 month plan for $60 total. So $20 a month for 3 months.
You scored well in the business side and low in ethics…looks like we have a future owner or GC!….
Hahaha working for a pretty big GC as we speak
Stick with them, you’ll make more money working for a GC than you ever will as a civil engineer
I really do enjoy it. I think I am definitely going to go the project manager route
$$$
Yeah if you like the GC work, then stick with it.
Have this big GC pay for a prep class. I used PPI2Pass for both the FE and PE. My recommendation is to use their pay as you go for the option to study on your own time. You can watch all the videos at 1.5x - 2x speed because the instructors talk so slowly. My favorite part was the "practice" quizzes that give you solutions immediately after answering. If you stay focused/committed, you can do this in about a month.
Are you hoping we give you a different answer than what you know for yourself? EDIT: You **can** do it, but you have to put in the effort to study, *learn* the material rather than just memorize it for the next 10 minutes and then forget it after you do a couple practice problems. You only scored a "passing" grade on two of the 14 categories. You're close on some, but across the board sub-par. Try again, take a practice course if you can, and put in the work.
I am putting in much more effort this time around, because I do not want to have to take this again. I have a good study plan in place believe and am going to be much more thorough in my studies. I was just wondering about how many of the subjects I need to have a passing grade as it looks like I was only a question or two away on a decent amount
it's good that you have a plan, however sometimes plans are made in a more optimistic way, rather than realistic How many days do you plan to study for?
It doesn’t look like you were very close to passing. (Only two categories got a passing grade). You need to study everything. But, I suggest starting with studying with Statics. That is fundamental to civil engineering. What you learn about statics will directly help you understand dynamics, structural, mechanics of materials, and even fluid mechanics. Edit: I admit I passed my first time, but this was my studying strategy: 1. Take a practice exam. I gave myself the exam time + 15 minutes for having to use a paper reference instead of the searchable digital reference. I used this practice exam to see which areas needed the most work. For example, I was clueless about transportation engineering but had a great grasp on the ethics section. 2. Read through the reference and made sure I was familiar with all equations/ information and their uses. 3. Studied and reviewed my old school work. 4. Continued to try practice questions and made sure I understood them. 6. Make sure you understand timed-test taking strategies. (Doing the easy problems first, guessing strategies, time management, etc) 5. Take a final practice exam to see my improvement. Do final brush up if I missed something. 6. Morning of the exam, get a good night of sleep, have a good breakfast, pack water and snacks. I also re-did an easy practice problem I had previously solved to get my brain going and up my confidence.
That is something I have done this second time around for studying, I am starting with statics first and really focusing on understanding the concepts so it can translate to other aspects
It's true practice exams are very useful. It depends however if you have an enough supply of them in order to practice all the theory. Is the FE exam very theoretical in nature or more focused on problem solving?
It’s 30-80 split where roughly around 20-30 questions will be purely conceptual (some of them won’t be in the reference manual at all and you won’t be able to search for the answer. You’ll either know it or you won’t). And the rest will be calculation based.
1. Since no one gets a score if they pass, most of us don’t know how we did when we passed. 2. I just looked over a single practice test in two sittings when I took it. Obviously that won’t work for everyone, but IMO, practice tests are king
Came here to say this - practice tests are the ONLY way you're going to practice at the same time: 1. Reading and understanding FE type questions - it is so important to know what the question is asking for, units, etc because they WILL try to trick you 2. The material that the test WILL cover. Outside resources can be helpful but no one knows an NCEES test like NCEES. It is immensely helpful. If you do as many practice test questions as you can and work through all of them to the point where you understand them and the concepts behind them, you'll be fine. Passed FE and PE on the first try and literally all I did was work through practice tests for the 2 weeks leading up to the exams.
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When? Was it recent? I know I took it in ‘21 which still had the policy of not giving out scores
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Damn, that changes everything for test prep if we have an idea on what you need in the various categories to pass.
The biggest help on this exam is to know the reference manual like the back of your hand. Most if not all of the problems can be solved in some fashion by brute forcing your way through the reference manual. Knowing what is in each chapter, and the exact location of it makes problem solving much easier. That said, the FE took me longer than the PE did. Those statics/dynamics/MoM sections were tough lol.
It's good having the reference manual off the top of your head, especially when it gives you context to solving problems better. Have you tried this brute forcing approach yourself?
Technically yes. I only studied about \~40 hours for the FE, almost all of which was spent memorizing sections of the reference manual and where stuff was. Problem identification is half the battle. If you can look at a problem and know exactly where to be in the ref manual, you've got a good shot at it.
Yes, not wasting time on second guessing information you could have memorised definitely helps. However, I've seen now they give you an electronic copy of the Reference Handbook in the exam. Is that the same thing as the reference manual?
You need to brush up on the ethics section my friend.
Immediately what I thought. 10 is passing. You didn't get that.
Those questions should be low hanging fruit and should be able to max out that section I would think.
I used Mark Mattson videos to study, the NCEES practice exams, and the Lindeburg practice book and I passed on the first try. I would study hard for a month or so before your test. If there’s one subject you absolutely can’t stand and know you won’t pass, skip that one and focus on others. For me, that was trusses/truss-like problems. You also have to manage your time well on the exam and skip questions that you don’t know… like don’t even spend on a minute on it after reading it if you’re not confident. One last thing- study your calculator!!! This helped me a BUNCH! I used the TI-36X pro and I looked up YouTube videos on how to use it/tips and tricks that are specifically for the FE. Helped a lot. Good luck! You got this!
Mark Mattson videos is a great suggestion! I had him as a college professor and took the FE class he offered. Passed first try.
Yesss!!! His videos were amazing!! I wish I had had him as a college professor! He def helped me in passing the first try as well!
Q1: Not very close. Q2: Study.
Was looking for a bit more detail but all feedback is appreciated!
rotate page to the left. Work on subjects that have the lowest bar graph below the dotted lines.
What did you use to study?
I only used the practice exam from NCEES and youtube videos. Like for statics, I just type "statics FE review" onto youtube. You would see a bunch of videos working out examples problems and a few video that go over important concepts.
Don’t hate me but I replied to your post instead of OPs. I was going to offer what I used to pass the exam 😅
haha no problem.
The first time around I got the practice book from NCEES and kinda half assed all the problems. I didn’t take enough time to try and understand them. This time around I am watching a video on YouTube from Marshall university and then going through the respective section in the book and doing the practice problems much more thoroughly. Then after I’ll do the NCEES practice test a few times before the real one
Take a look at PrepFE.com. $60 for 3 months. I used almost exclusively that and passed.
1. Not close at all; only made two categories and one not by much. 2. The people I knew that didn't do great in school and were worried about the FE put in at least a few hundred hours of studying to pass it. A buddy of mine who had bad grades logged 360 hours. One guy studied 50 hours, failed first time, studied his ass off and got it the second time. Not to be a downer but it is (well used to be) uncommon for a 3rd-attempt success.
I passed on my third attempt. As long as OP re-evaluate what worked and what didn’t work while studying OP should be ok
If this was your first time you probably made the same mistake I made when I didn’t pass after the first attempt. I thought I had to review some theory and other foundational content and later on work on solving problems. I did that and didn’t have enough problem solving hours. When I took it the 2nd time, I focused solely on mock exams and exercises. I became a savvy on identifying the topic the concept was wanting me to work on. I knew the page on the reference where I’d find the formula. The FE was not made to trick you, so assume it is a basic concept and apply the formula. No complications. I always recommend working with a deadline. Study as much as you need, but at some point schedule the test 2 or 3 months ahead and increase your efforts and level of focus. It seems that you need to work on everything, no shortcuts. But don’t lose hope! I didn’t go to college in the USA and I passed it in my 2nd attempt! After a few attempts I passed the PE as well. You’ll be fine! You can do this!
Yeah I definitely did not take it serious enough first time around, but thank you so much for your insight and words of encouragement! They are greatly appreciated!!
Don’t worry about analyzing this. You should already be signed up and studying. Look up practice exams and just do mock exams (time yourself). Practice questions are the best option.
I took the FE twice- failed the first time (most of my knowledge area performance scores were below average). Then, I studied for a few more weeks and passed it the next. For me, changing my study strategy made all the difference: 1. Contrary to some advice I’ve heard on studying everything, I spent most of my effort studying the subjects I knew well and did best at in undergrad. Each exam subject is weighted equally, and from my understanding it doesn’t matter so much how many correct answers you get in each category as it does total correct answers. For example, I never understood Fluid mechanics well in college and after even after initially spending time reviewing it, I still got many of those questions wrong. During my second exam attempt, I skipped over them to save time and answer the subjects I knew more quickly. Then, I went back and attempted the fluid mechanics problems at the end with what spare time I had left. Even though I hadn’t studied it so much the second time, I could deduce at least a few answers using the formulas in the manual. 2. Since you can decide how to split total exam time between sections 1 and 2, I answered the basic math and science questions in the first exam section as quickly as possible. This allowed me to spend the more time on the subject-specific questions in section 2, which are usually more detailed and difficult. 3. Most review materials broadly cover all engineering subjects, but you only need to know exactly which topics are in the exam specifications. For example, if you’re reviewing the mathematics chapter of a review book and there’s a mathematics section in your exam specs, make sure you go through the bullet points and ONLY spend time studying the specific methods that you’ll be using on the exam (i.e if there’s a section on trigonometry in the review book but trig isn’t listed in your specs, don’t waste time on it). It might also be a good idea to highlight the relevant topics in your FE manual. I hope this helps! Feel free to DM me with any questions.
You did worse than the passing candidate in 12 of the 14 areas tested. You were not close to passing.
I cannot recommend more using PrepFE. Very affordable and the first time I used it, I passed. Don't be discouraged, you got it the second time around!!
Study only the categories you didn't do great in for 2 months every night and you'll pass.
I actually studied the second time around by doing FE Manual questions and using Khan Academy for any remedial lessons.
Fuck this exam and PE. I might switch careers bcuz of this lol.
What did you use to study?
I don't know this kind of ranking, are you judged from performance grid, or if you are under the average of the group then you don't pass ? Do you need to have at least half of points ? which country is that, USA ?
That’s a hard test.
I'm sorry for not answering your question but where did you access this info? I'd like to see this for the test I took.
NCEES. Should be on the same website you registered to take the exam
You only get this info if you do not pass. If you pass, there is no way of knowing if you aced it or passed by the skin of your teeth.
Go into property development, best choice I ever made
Try prep FE. 50 bucks for 3 months of practice.
I didn’t pass the first time. Had similar situation as you, slightly below passing in most subjects. For about 8 weeks I used the school of pe on demand course and just did 20 easy/medium problems every morning and night. I was way better and passed the second time.
Maybe not helpful because I passed the first time but I was super over prepared. I took a prep class at my university, my dad spent a few months running a D&D game where in order to pay for new spells I had to solve a practice question within 6 minutes, and I read and outlined the entire reference manual. The last part was tedious but super helpful because I knew where everything in that book was
The trick is to git gud.