Welcome!

Welcome to The Ultimate Civil FE Review Course! We are pumped to have you here! Keep in mind that this journey is a marathon and not a sprint. We will make sure to get you through the topics you need covered, and be here to support you every step of the way.

Speaking of support, there are a few ways to ask questions:

1) You can comment at the bottom of every module here. Just leave comments, and we'll do our best to jump on quickly and get you an answer.

2) Join our private Facebook group and ask away. We will jump on and get you an answer by either us, our CEA team or the group on there to support one another. You can request access here!

3) Email Mark or me directly, and we will get you an answer - pronto (either by us or our team)! You can email us at [email protected] and [email protected]. We are here to help!

You can see that support is all around you. We've got your back. Now just start plugging through each module and, more importantly, do a TON of practice problems. You'll find them in the lectures and in the video problem archive. Getting these under your belt will ultimately be what launches you into passing. It will also get you used to thumb through the NCEES manual to find equations, etc. You must get used to using that manual. It's the only reference they let you use (as a PDF) on this computer-based testing exam.

How to Tackle the Course

There are a few ways you can tackle this course material to make your studies effective. You could go right through each lecture module and then save all the video problem archive problems until the end, but that might not be the best.

This is what I would personally do:

1 - Listen to an entire lecture series, like math, do the problems in the videos, and then when done with the lectures, work on the problems related to math in our video problem archive. This way, you get the lecture done, get a bit of practice within the lecture, and then more practice with problems. Continue this until you finish the course.

2 - Do a PDF practice exam about 1/2 to 2/3rds through the course. This will help you gauge where you are at. This would include your strengths as well as your weakness. You can then make sure to hit the weakest areas hard as you go through things.

3 - Do the CBT exam simulator close to your exam date. Maybe do this 2 to 3 weeks before your exam. This will provide you with the same information as the PDF exam (knowing your strength and weaknesses) and you can put some polish on those topics in need.

4 - Take advantage of our private FB community for support. Don't hesitate to ask questions, ask for help with gaps in knowledge, or anything else having to do with the FE exam. We are here to support you and want you to succeed.

You'll want to print out all the problems in our video problem archive and probably bind them so you can work them on your own. There are also plenty of practice problems within the lectures; you can print those slides off within each lecture module. The key to passing the FE exam is practicing many problems, and we aim to provide that for you.

If you've found that you've run out, you may want to buy more just to keep doing them.

What to Expect on Exam Day

The exam is six hours long and includes an 8-minute tutorial, a 25-minute break, and a brief survey at the conclusion of the exam. The total time you’ll have to actually answer the exam questions is 5 hours and 20 minutes. The problem-solving pace works out to slightly less than 3 minutes per question, and you may work through the questions (in that session) in any sequence. If you want to go back and check your answers before you submit a session for grading, you may. However, once you submit a section, you are not able to go back and review it. You have a total of 110 questions to answer covering 18 topics of study (check out your NCEES specifications for the FE Civil Exam).

You can divide your time between the two sessions any way you’d like. That is if you want to spend 4 hours in the first section, and 1 hour and 20 minutes in the second section, you could do so. Between sessions, you can take a 25-minute break. You can take less time if you would like, but you cannot work through the break, and the break time cannot be added to the time permitted for either session. Once each session begins, you can leave your seat for personal reasons, but the “clock” does not stop for your absence. Unanswered questions are scored the same as questions answered incorrectly, so you should use the last few minutes of each session to guess all unanswered questions.

Each Exam is Different

The exam you take will not be the exam taken by the person sitting next to you. Differences between exams go beyond mere sequencing differences. NCEES says that the CBT system will randomly select different, but equivalent, questions from its database for each examiner using a linear-on-the-fly (LOFT) algorithm. Each examiner will have a unique exam of equivalent difficulty, so looking at your neighbor’s monitor would be a waste of time.

How They Ask Questions

Let's talk about these alternative item-type problems. Our material is built off the NCEES specifications so you'll get exposure to what you need but you should know that these questions might require you to get a little creative in selecting the answers. Let's go over it:

Multiple Choice

• Select one correct answer from four given options
• If you are unsure of what the correct answer is you should make an educated assumption. You will not be penalized for a wrong answer.

Multiple Choice (Check-All-That-Apply)

• Select all the correct choices from the list by clicking on each one
• All of the correct answers (and only all of the correct answers) must be selected; there is no partial credit
• If you change your mind, click on a choice to de-select it

Point-and-Click (Hot Spot, or Mark Location)

• Click on a single target, or hot spot icon, to place on the base image in the correct location or general area
• If you change your mind, click again on your choice to unselect, or click on the new preferred answer

Drag-and-Place

• These questions may ask you to sort, rank, place, or label items. Confirm whether all items need to be chosen or moved, then be sure to sort, rank, place, or label each one
• After you have decided the proper sorting, ranking, placing, or labeling, click and drag an object to the target spot
• If you change your answer, you can move an object to a different open spot in the target area, or you can move it back to the starting area

Fill-in-the-Blank

• Read the answer specification carefully; it should state the number of decimal places for your numeric answer
• Compute your answer, then round if needed to the required number of decimal places (0-4, round down; 5-9, round up)
• Do not enter the units for your answer
• Do not spell out a number, like “four”
• If you change your mind, blank out the entire field before you enter another answer

Case Study

• May be multiple-choice, check-all-that-apply, hot spot, drag-and-place, or fill-in-the-blank
• You are able to click on browser-like tabs on top of the computer screen to go back and forth between the case study scenario and resource documents provided

Team Members in the Course

In the course, you'll see a few team members that will be either in videos or support questions. These include myself (Isaac Oakeson), my brother, Mark Oakeson, and our team members Jason Chao (video problems), and Fransisca Wijaya (lead support), and Cody Sims (video problems). Mark and I will be jumping on to help answer questions found throughout the comment sections, via email, and on our private FB group.

Alright, that about wraps it up. Let's get into it now so you can get to the actual work. If you have questions about the exam or any comments, leave them below or jump on the private FB group, and we'll get your questions answered!

Let's do this!!

Receipt and Billing Issues

If you have billing questions, please use the link below that will take you to a customer hub on Thrive Cart. Thrive Cart is the checkout platform used when you purchased this course (unless you found it through Teachable). To review your purchase, check your membership status, update your credit card, and get a receipt (it should have been emailed to you), please check out the customer hub below. You can also email me at isaac@civilengineeringacademy, and we'll take care of you.

https://civilengineeringacademy.thrivecart.com/updateinfo/

Ok, let's get rolling.

Isaac Oakeson, PE

Mark Oakeson, PE, SE