what's up guys welcome back to another video I'm Rob Lurch and today I'm going to be giving you a complete guide on how to pass the PE civil exam if you enjoy the content please smash the like button subscribe to the channel and you can follow me on Instagram at the luris monster all right let's get into it now a little bit about me I'm a professional civil engineer right now I work in New York City in Manhattan I have about six years of total work experience I've worked on so many different projects over the years years like roadway Highway design storm water management site civil design I've done project management um just a lot of great experience so far before working I got my master's degree from Columbia University in civil engineering and before that I got my undergrad civil engineering degree from Stonybrook University about two years ago in 2022 I took the PE exam my specialty was water resources and environmental and thankfully I passed it and today I just want to give you as much advice as I can tell you pass the PE exam as well now to give you some background information about what the PE exam is it is the professional engineering exam it's basically going to test you out on everything you've learned in your working experience now in New York state typically you need an undergraduate degree from an abet accredited college then you need to sit and take the Fe exam which is the fundamentals of engineering exam that's going to test you out on everything you've learned in your undergraduate degree then you need four years of working experience under under a professional engineer now if you have a master's degree that counts as one year so you only need three years of working experience once you have all of that then you can sit for the PE exam the professional engineering exam and once you pass that exam you get your license number your sign seal you can stamp and sign off on documents it opens up a ton of job opportunities um offers up a lot of promotions a lot of pay raises so it's super super important to strive and get the PE license now let's talk about the PE exam format it is computer-based you'll go to a test taking Center to take it they'll give you all the references you need on the computer so you don't bring any references with you there's a total of 80 questions and you'll be given eight hours to solve all those 80 questions if you break that down that's six minutes per question which is extremely important and I'll talk about that a little later on in this video before the exam starts you'll be given a 10minute tutorial and once you solve the first 40 questions you're given a 50 minute optional break and then you proceed with the next 40 questions so it's 8 hours of Total test taking time but the entire experience is 9 hours long if you account for the 10-minute tutorial and the 50-minute optional break you need about a 70% to pass the PE exam 70% of 80 questions is about 60 Questions you need correct minimum to pass which is really important I'll talk about that a little later on now the NCS did update the PE civil exam specifications as of April 2024 this includes the Water Resources exam structural geotechnical and transportation and basically what they did was they removed the breath questions on each of those exams this results in less topics on each exam but more specialized questions directly related to the specialty that you choose okay so now you understand what the PE exam is let's talk about the steps you need to take to pass the P exam the first step is to choose a calculator that is approved by the NCS I'll put the calculator policy below so definitely check that out but basically choose a calculator you're very familiar with approved by the NCS this is the calculator I use it's the ti30xs I've used this calculator since high school I know every function on it and that's what you have to do you have to choose a calculator you're very familiar with you're comfortable with you understand completely and as you do your practice problems and prepare for the P exam make sure you use your calculator The Next Step you have to do is choose the special that you want to be tested on now I chose water resources and environmental this is because my master's degree is in that topic and also I felt most comfortable being questioned on this specialty and I had most confidence in passing it so that's what you have to do choose the specialty that you feel most confident in passing and then go from there next step you have to take is download all the references that will be given to you on exam day the NCS does list these references out and they provide everybody with the reference handbooks so make sure you download that and depending on what specialty you choose you'll be given additional references as well which you should download and use as you do your practice problems now on exam day you can use keywords to search through these references to save time and it's really really important that you download these references look through them fully understand where all the equations and concepts are so that on exam day there's no surprises and you're not wasting time looking for certain equations or concepts you know them exactly like the back of your hand and you're ready to go all right so you chose your calculator you chose your specialty and you downloaded your references you're ready to start preparing for the PE civil exam now the best way to prepare and pass the PE civil exam is through an online course now when I prepared for the Fe exam and the PE exam I went with the school of PE online course and they prepared me extremely well I felt very confident going into both the Fe exam and the PE exam and thankfully I passed both with the school of pe's guidance and help now the national passing rate for the PE civil exam is an average of 61% when you take the school of PE online course that passing rate jumps up to 93% the school of PE online courses will give you everything you need to prepare and feel confident in going into the PE exam they'll give you lecture videos lecture notes flashcards tons of practice problems that are very similar level of difficulty to what you'll see on the real exam they'll give you this question Bank online which is basically an exam simulator it simulates real full-time exams 80 questions just like what you'll see on the exam day the best thing about this tool is that once you finish the exam it'll tell you your exact score as well as how you scored on each of the different topics this will let you know how ready you are to take the real PE exam their online courses are updated to account for those April 2024 new specs which I discussed earlier and the school PE does offer online tutoring so you can have that option as well to prepare and I do have a discount code Lurch 100 for $100 off any of their online courses which I highly recommend if you want to check them out I'll put the link in description below now in addition to the online course I do recommend two practice exams that help you prepare for the PE exam the first one today is by the school of PE these are their new workbooks here I have the PE civil water resources and environmental workbook these are updated with a new April 2024 spec it comes with 80 great practice problems a very similar level of what you'll see to the real exam 80 detailed Solutions and my favorite part about these workbooks they give you the direct reference to the Civil handbook so you won't be wondering where they got their equations from or their solutions from it tells you exactly where they got them from very detailed solutions for 40 to 50 bucks it's a no-brainer and they do offer them an ebook format as well so definitely check that out I'll put the link in the description below the next practice exam is by the NC this is an absolute classic one thing I'd like to note is that they only offer these in the ebook format this is an older version they are updated to the April 2024 spec 80 great practice problems 80 Solutions very similar level of difficulty to what you'll see on the exam um for 40 to 50 bucks to me it's a no-brainer I'll also put the link in the description below for this guy now one thing I like to note with these practice exams because they are very similar level of difficulty to what you'll see on the real exam and because you only need a 70% to pass the real exam if you could take both of these and score about I would say 60 to 65 questions correct out of the 80 you're in pretty good standing to take the real exam so not only are these great practice they're great indicators on how well you are ready to take the real PE now let's talk about General studying tips the first tip that I have is be consistent in your studies when I studied for the P exam I studied for about five months and pretty much every single day leading up to the exam I did take off Fridays but Monday through Thursday before and after work I put in about an hour of study time doing practice problems looking looking through the references looking through different solutions watching lecture videos and on the weekends I went to the library every single weekend Saturday and Sunday and put about five to six hours just doing practice problems and going through my online course now it was really important to be consistent because there's so many different topics and material on the P exam that if you studied once or twice a week by the next week you're going to forget what you studied last week so it's really about taking a little step forward continuously studying each and every day and building upon what you've learned the previous day the next tip I have is just do practice problems over and over and over again as well as practice exams this is by far the best way to prepare it's really rinse recycle repeat do your practice problems keep in mind the six minutes per question user references get familiar with those and just continuously do them throughout each day and that'll help you prepare to take the real PE the next tip that I have is make sure you schedule your exam ahead of time this is because it'll add a little pressure knowing your exam Day is coming up let's say you get home from work and you don't have your exam scheduled you're not going to have the pressure or the motivation to study on those days that you're tired however if you know your exam is in two months and that date is set you're going to get that little pressure that little kick in the booty to actually study do some practice problems even when you're tired after work the next tip that I have is make sure you focus on understanding concepts in your studies this is because the NCS will test you on how well you understand civil engineering Concepts it's not going to test you on if you can memorize certain practice problems or not it's really about if you can understand the concepts that you're being tested on all right let's talk about test taking tips the first tip that I have is time management there's 80 questions on the PE you're given eight hours to solve those 80 questions break that down that's six minutes per question the key here is to not spend more than 6 minutes on any question as you go along on the exam this is because you're risking not getting to the easier questions later on you have to answer all the questions they're all equal to the same amount of points and believe me there's certain questions on the exam that are a lot easier than other questions so if you get to a question you get stuck on it flag it move on go to the easier questions and then come back to that question you got stuck on and then give it your best shot the next tip that I have is you do not need to answer the questions in order 1 through 80 if you get to question one and you get stuck on it flag it move on the key similar to time management is to go to the easiest questions first get those correct and then go back to the harder questions that you flagged make sure you use your references but make sure you go to Every problem on the exam solve the easiest ones first doesn't have to be in order and then go back to the ones you flagged later on the next tip is a no-brainer but make sure you read every single question on the exam twice read it slowly and fully understand what they they want you to solve for and make sure you understand what units they want you to solve in this is because the people that make the exam will put one to two words in some of the questions to try to trick you give you an example maybe the question has all units in feet and then they want you to solve the answer in inches the answers they give you one of the correct answers is going to be in inches and they're going to put like a little devious answer that's in feet to try to trick you so basically read the question slowly read it twice fold understand what they want you to solve for and what units they want you to solve in the next tip I have is make sure you use your references use keywords to search through them to save time use the reference handbook and use your specialized references that you're given as well you'll be surprised how much great content information Concepts and equations those references have that'll help you solve the problems on the PE exam the last tip that I have is the method of back solving this is a last Stitch hail effort to get the question correct now let's say you flagged the question you moved on and you've come back to it you used your references and you have no idea how to solve the problem this is where the method of back solving comes into play for the multiple choice questions you have to remember they're going to give you four potentially correct answers one of those answers is correct and it's on the screen in front of you so what you have to do is take each of those answers plug them back into the question and this will allow you to eliminate at least one very obviously wrong answer giving you a better shot at solving the correct one well that's everything that I have for you today if you enjoy the content and if you learn something please smash the like button subscribe to the channel and you can follow me on Instagram at the lurches monster and of course if you have any questions please comment below I will be more than happy to help you remember if I get past the P exam I know for a fact you can as well believe in yourself hey I believe in you thanks so much for watching have a great day