Exams after undergraduate

[ZebraRampage]

I am just finishing up my undergraduate degree in December, and I had to take an exam in April in regard to my major. It wasn't required, but I took it because it will aid me in furthering my career. The exam was called the FE exam. FE stands for Fundamentals of Engineering. I just found out that I passed the test today, so I'm really happy about the news. The FE exam is the first step toward becoming a Professional Engineer. Once I get my degree I will be an EIT, Engineer in Training, because I will have a certificate saying that I passed the FE exam. After 4 or 5 years of work experience after becoming an EIT I will then have to take the PE exam, Principles and Practice of Engineer, to become a Professional Engineer. That just means that I get the title of PE after my name, and it allows me to review and stamp drawings, etc. It's like having MD after your name if you're a Doctor.

Anyway, I was just curious if anyone else has had to take exams toward the end of their undergraduate education in regard to their degree? I know that there's the GRE, which is required for getting into Grad school, but there are other exams as well that some grad programs require. Also there are exams like the one I took that aren't required, but definitely encouraged. So what other tests to students with different majors have to take?

[Bond]

Congratulations!


I just started studying for the LSAT (for law school), which I'll have to take in about a year. Studying so far has been a blast...

For MBA school you have to take the GMAT, and for medical school you have to take the MCAT. Those are the only other ones I can think of at the moment.

[KillerGremlin]

The GRE comes to mind. I think it varies from school to school and depending on the program, but the MCAT and LSAT are the big ones that come to mind for me.

Be prepared for many engineering exams for the rest of your life, Zebra. My dad has been working for 20+ years and even for his last job he had to take like 9 hours of tests for his job. They want qualified engineers I guess.

The same goes for medical, but that's like a "no duh."

[manasecret]

Was the FE tough? How much studying did you do? Did you take complete practice tests? The last test I took like that was even remotely similar was the SAT, which I did well on. Was it anything like that?

I'm an EE and I should take the FE. I'd be several years into my 5 years if I had just taken it when I graduated.

[ZebraRampage]

Was the FE tough? How much studying did you do? Did you take complete practice tests? The last test I took like that was even remotely similar was the SAT, which I did well on. Was it anything like that?

I'm an EE and I should take the FE. I'd be several years into my 5 years if I had just taken it when I graduated.

http://www.ncees.org/exams/fundamentals/

The FE Exam was both tough and not tough..it's hard to explain. The first half was the general engineering section, which was 120 multiple choice questions. The second half was the part of your specific discipline, and it is 60 multiple choice questions. I took the Civil Engineering section, while you'll take the Electrical Engineering section. Each section is 4 hours long, and there was a little over an hour break between them for lunch and relaxing.

I didn't actually do any practice tests. I tried to study a little bit of each topic, but overall I didn't study much. The FE exam was on April 25th this year, which was the Saturday following Finals week for me at Pitt..which sucked, but I only had one final during finals week. The other finals were done the week before. Not to mention, on April 17th my long sickness started with that 103 fever that I mentioned earlier. It wasn't until after I took the FE exam that I found out that I had mono. With all of that on my plate, I really didn't have much time to study for the FE exam during April. I probably should have started studying earlier.

The best way to go about it is make sure you know the concepts for the topics that are on the exam, and just trust that you'll be able to remember the details. The problems aren't VERY hard, but some of them look like it at first. Some of them are there to trick you, but if you look at them hard enough you'll see where they try to trick you, but you can't spend too much time on each problem.



Here's a link to the material that's on the exam if you haven't already seen it.

http://www.ncees.org/exams/fundamentals/fe_exam_specs.pdf


The first half has all the basic stuff that all engineers need to know such as Math, Physics, Chemistry, Statics, Dynamics, Strength of Materials, Material Properties, Prob Stat, Economics, Etc...

As I mentioned before, the second half has stuff geared toward your specific engineering major. I'm sure you'll know what to study for this better than I would know for you.

Like I said before, don't focus on the details. If you're studying calculus for instance, don't study SPECIFIC ways to take derivatives and integrals of strange functions. Just make sure you know how to take a derivative of a certain function, and then maybe make sure you know the rules for taking derivatives of trig functions, and the same goes for intergrals of trig functions. There are some other ones like the derivative and intregral of e and ln, that you might just want to make sure of..but don't try to memorize specifics of really really complicated derivatives and integrals. This test doesn't get too extraordinary.

To be honest, I figured I'd pass the test, but I knew that I couldn't just relax about it. I took it seriously, and used a lot of logic. I didn't stay on any problem for too long, and yes there were some that I had to guess on at the end, but it's better to get done what you know first, so do that, and don't waste time. If you have time to check it over, do so, but don't over do it because you might start second guessing yourself on problems that you were originally confident on.


Keep in mind that there are engineers who fail, but a good amount do pass. For instance, I knew that 92% of Civil Engineers at Pitt passed the FE exam on their first try, so that gave me a lot of confidence that I would do well, because I'm definitely in good standing in my class. You've had all of the material, or at least most of it, so you should be capable of getting answers right, so just trust yourself that you can do it.

[manasecret]

Thanks for the tips! I'm glad to hear it's all multiple choice, that makes it considerably easier IMO.

I'd definitely have to do a review now that I'm a couple years out of undergrad. I work in an engineering field, but I rarely use anything involving Physics, Chemistry, Statics, Dynamics, Strength of Materials, Material Properties, Prob Stat, or Economies. Hmmmm maybe my job is engineering-lite.

But I know after a day or two of reviewing that it would all be fresh in my head again. Except for Strength of Materials and Material Properties. I never took anything on those.

I guess it was true what everyone said back as a senior. It's best to take the FE while all that stuff that you may or may not use later is still fresh in your head!

[ZebraRampage]

Thanks for the tips!

I'd definitely have to do a review now that I'm a couple years out of undergrad. I work in an engineering field, but I rarely use anything involving Physics, Chemistry, Statics, Dynamics, Strength of Materials, Material Properties, Prob Stat, or Economies. Hmmmm maybe my job is engineering-lite.

But I know after a day or two of reviewing that it would all be fresh in my head again. Except for Strength of Materials and Material Properties. I never took anything on those.

I guess it was true what everyone said back as a senior. It's best to take the FE while all that stuff that you may or may not use later is still fresh in your head!


Yeah, that always was a good tip, because you don't realize how fast you lose all that information. Plus, I should have mentioned that you'll need to do more of a review than I did, because you've been out of school for a little bit now, so sorry about that.


I just wanted to point out one more thing. There are more subjects on the general section of the test than those, I just wrote a few down. The other topics that I didn't get to are Computers, Ethics and Business Practice, Fluid Mechanics, Electricity and Magnetism(which I'm sure you would have looked at in Physics if I hadn't mentioned it), and Thermodynamics. As for Economics, it's Engineering Economics, so it's a bit different than say Micro or Macro economics. And prob and stat is Engineering Prob and Stat, because calculus is used it in, so it's harder than a general Prob and Stat class. If you click on the second link that I posted earlier, you'll see the details of every topic that is covered, so make sure to look at it.