Studying means something different to everyone. The amount of studying you need to do depends on your level of knowledge of the subject and how much information you can retain each time you study. In this post I will provide 4 minimum studying activities you need to do for an engineering licensing exam (whether it’s FE, PE, SE, or another exam) to give you a good shot at passing. It’s up to you to calibrate this guideline to your specific needs and level of knowledge.
The most important thing about studying is that you need to have a plan and try to stick to it as much as possible. It’s okay to tweak the study plan as you progress, but you need to keep going forward with the plan instead of stopping or getting sidetracked. For the 4 study plan components that I’m recommending, I will break them down into rough percentage of how much studying time you should put into each. Everyone’s main emphasis will be different, but this is just an example of what I think is a reasonable breakdown.
1. Reading/brushing up on concepts from review books/textbooks (35%)
This is the self-studying component and should be done at the beginning of your studying period for the exam. This is a good opportunity for you to gauge how much you know about the subjects on the test. If you find yourself spending too much time just learning or relearning about a subject then you definitely need to do study activity #2 below.
I suggest you spend the majority of time for this activities on subjects that you know somewhat to very well. Trying to study brand new materials by reading textbooks or review books without anyone helping you understand the concept can be a real time sucker. Make a judgement call and not waste too much time on subjects that are difficult to learn and are not expected to give you a lot of points on the exam.
For me, I basically self-studied for the vertical portion of the SE exam so I know that with good discipline, reading/studying review books can be very helpful. In fact, I remembered reading/studying the PE Structural Reference Manual from cover to cover for 3 months and basically used that reference book to pass my SE vertical exam.
2. Attend a review class (25%)
This studying activity is highly recommended especially if you are struggling to understand some subjects critical to passing the exam. A review class acts as a great refresher on subjects you know well but more importantly help you understand subjects you don’t know well. It’s easier to learn when you have someone explaining concepts to you rather than you trying to learn them from scratch (saves you time too!). Another great thing about a review class is that you have a live instructor that you can ask questions and get an immediate response to your questions. In addition, when you are in the class, you also find students that are on the same exam path as you and everyone can help each other study and learn off each other. I remember when I was teaching the SE and PE class with PPI, a student posted a question in the class forum about missing a reference material for the exam and he would get multiple response from other students to help him get that reference. A good support group from something such as a review class is a good resource for you for the exam.
I would imagine a lot of people are hesitant to take a review class because of the inconvenience of going/attending class and high cost of signing up for the class. I definitely understand that work and family can prevent you from going to an exam review class regularly. The good news is that everything is digital now and there are excellent review classes online that you can attend from the comfort of your home (and you can view recorded class lectures if you have time conflicts). As for cost of the review class, check with your employer because a lot of them pay for this expense as part of tuition reimbursement or employee career development since an engineering license helps your career AND the company. Even if your company doesn’t pay for the class cost, it’s still a good investment in yourself to give you a better chance of obtaining your professional engineering license.
PPI offers a variety of excellent review classes that you can take (I have taught a few of them in the past myself!) Click on the links below if you want to sign up for them.
FE/EIT Chemical, Civil, Electrical, Mechanical, Other Disciplines Review Classes
3. Do example problems (35%)
As the old saying goes, practice makes perfect so you need to do as many practice problems as you can to prepare of the exam. This is probably the most important studying activity you can do to prepare of the exam. I can almost guarantee that you won’t be able to pass the exam if your only preparations are reading references and attending review classes. Doing practice problems sharpens your critical thinking skills and helps you know pitfalls to avoid when taking the actual exam. I remember that there were times I read through some explanation of an example problem and thought that it made perfect sense, but then when I actually sat down and do practice problems for that particular topic, I froze up and didn’t know how to solve it. If you do enough practice problems, you will have a lot of confidence on the exam and know exactly what to do even if the exam writer throws a twist at you.
4. Practice exams (5%)
This probably takes the least amount of your studying time but is still very important. You should do the practice exam toward the end of your studying and closer to exam time. It’s a definitely must do. Click here for another of my article explaining why this is an important studying activity.
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