The format has changed quite a bit since I took the FE, so the info below is severly dated. Check out NCEES for more info.
[Original Post - 06/2013]
So you've signed up on the FE and you've waited til the last minute to study for it? No worries.
Suffice to say there are numerous posts on strategies for passing the FE exam. Some are completely crazy. Here was my approach to taking and passing the FE. Did I mention I passed the FE?
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| Not sure if you noticed; it says PASS. |
[Background]
As a EE there were a couple of things to worry about:
- Compared to all other engineering disciplines electrical engineers have the lowest pass rate for first time and repeat takers. I'm assuming that the graders are biased of how awesome we are.
- The morning section is chocked full of subjects that mean little to nothing to EEs: mechanics, thermodynamics, fluid flow, social skills. I made that last one up.
Also when I took the exam I was employed. And had friends. And hobbies. This ate up quite a lot of time, so I procrastinated til a week before the exam before opening a book.
[Studying/Prep]
The company I'm working for pays for our study materials so I got the following:
- The FE reference handbook. This is what you'll be using during the test, so get familiar with it. One annoying thing to remember is most constants for equations (such as 'r' for PV-nRT') only appear on the first page, and not the specific subsection that include the equation (i.e. the value for 'r' is not given in the thermo section).
- A book of practice exams. This is very brief and overpriced BUT I'd say it was the best piece of material I bought. You can take the exams in it quickly and they're very representative of what I saw on test day.
- Practice exams for the electrical section. This will expose you to the type of questions on the afternoon section. It's good for refreshing your memory on topics that might be fuzzy.
- A giant study guide broken down by section. This was fairly useless to me because I waited so long to start studying.
When you study remember that each section is 4 hours so if you're working full-time you'll be lucky to knock out a single 4 hour block each night. I made it through the Generic Practice exams and Electrical Specific exams before it was time for me to take the test (the 2nd and 3rd bullets above). This took me the better part of a week and also included time spent on wikipedia reviewing rusty subjects.
[Strategy]
If there is one thing you take away from my unstructured rambling let it be this: TAKE PRACTICE EXAMS, USE THE REFERENCE GUIDE, AND PRACTICE ON THE CALCULATOR YOU ARE BRINGING TO THE EXAM. Otherwise you'll be wasting valuable time trying to figure out where in the reference book you need to be and/or where buttons are on your calculator. Don't be a freshman.
If you wait to the last minute to study you need to prioritize. It occurred to me fairly immediately when studying that I needed to cut my losses and focus on passing the test and NOT mastering every topic. At this point in your career you should have a fairly firm grasp on what you're good at. Play to your strengths and use your weaknesses as your dump stat. If you're already a beast at math, power points, and digital design don't waste your time studying for it. Inversely, if you've never had a materials course there's absolutely no reason to spend valuable hours becoming an expert on tensile strength when it's only a fraction of the exam and you'll most likely never need it in the real world. That leaves us with that awkward middle area. For me these included statistics, economics, and thermodynamics. I spent a majority of my time studying this material because that's where the biggest gains in score could be achieved.
Most questions will have two stupid answers and two feasible ones. Being able to recognize and eliminate bad answers will all but guarantee a passing grade (50%) on the FE.
[Taking the Test]
Remember that this is an 8 hour exam. Don't stay up all night cramming because that is dumb. Get a good nights sleep, wake up on time, have some coffee and breakfast tacos, arrive early to the facility, run into someone you know and have a chat, find your section and be waiting when they open the doors.
The examiners are very strict about having foreign object in the room. Make sure you follow all the rules outlined in your testing documentation including having everything in a clear bag, don't wear a hat, don't bring outside pencils, have a valid ID and print out your exam authorization, use the right type of calculators, wear clothes, etc.
If you do leave you seat you have to go through a short check in/out procedure where the proctor picks up and holds your exam while you leave. This takes a little time so keep that in mind if you plan on running out of the room to vacate explosive diarrhea from your nervous gut that you shoved full of coffee and breakfast tacos.
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| WHY CHORIZO, WHY? |
There is an hour break between the morning and afternoon sections. In some places this isn't enough time to eat out and get back before the proctors lock the doors for of the afternoon section (that means you will fail). Brown bag it or order extra breakfast tacos in the morning and eat them in your car during the break like a weirdo.
[Results]
I passed.
Passing grants you the distinguished title of 'Engineer in Training', which to the layman sounds like an intern but oh well. It's also a good excuse to do a happy dance.
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