SE Exam

[VSS Engineering]

I will be taking the 16 hour SE exam in April of 2025. i have been studying off and on over the past couple years when time allowed. Now that I'm less than a year from the exam, I will need to begin studying much more regularly. I also plan to take a review course prior to taking the exam.

Looking for advise from those that have taken the exam as far what study material and/or review courses you found helpful and what was not. All recommendations are appreciated.

Thanks

 

[driftLimiter]

I took the AEI course and felt that it was very helpful and there were lots of great resources.

Also I joined a study group on discord that has a huge amount of resources available.
Link

I took the test after about 10 years of experience. And with the these resources passed the first time.

 

[canwesteng]

I'm in the AEI course now. It is pretty slow, at least in the breadth parts, but that means you get enough time to get a feel for some of the stuff you are weaker in. The real value is the webinars where you can ask questions in real time. I'd say there is no substitute for experience though, you should be pretty comfortable with at least a decent chunk of the test ahead of time. Caveat being that I haven't written the real test yet.

 

[HDStructural]

I used the PPI review course a few years back and thought it was very well done. It came with a lot of great books that were a big help. The books are great to have even if you can't bring them with you on test day. I still reference those review books often.

I agree with what canwesteng said about the live webinars. It is great to be able to ask questions to the instructors.

My advice would be to focus on the lateral portion first and take them one at a time. The logic is to get the hardest test (or what is normally hardest) out of the way first. After passing the lateral breadth and depth, start studying for the vertical. I know only one person who took both tests at the same time and passed them both. The vast majority passed vertical but failed lateral and some were never able to pass lateral after multiple attempts, again why I would suggest doing lateral first.

I only had the live webinars for when I studied for the lateral portion of the test but was able to download all of the review slides for vertical and used those for studying.

 

[Rsd789]

One thing that's been holding me back from taking the test is the lack of experience in complex lateral design. Usually my projects fall under SDC B with a rare occurrence falling under SDC C but haven't had the opportunity to get into any additional provisions when requiring SDC C. In addition, most of the steel framed lateral structures I work on usually utilize H. Steel systems not specifically detailed for seismic resistance.

My concerns are:
1) Those will be a large focus of the test and will require a lot of studying.
2) That if I haven't come across these designs in my 8 years of experience, is it worth studying and taking the test if I won't even use most of the knowledge I'd learn and would likely forget a lot of it because I won't use it

 

[Stenbrook]

I disagree with HDStructural about taking the lateral first. I think the gravity is important to take first as it requires you take a deep dive into all of the different materials and understand how those all work. It sets up a solid foundation that you can build off of to then take the Lateral which involves more structural analysis but still has material design involved. Also, all of last year, the gravity had much worse pass rates. (vertical at 26% in October compared to Lateral at 39%).

I had coworkers who took the AEI class for the lateral and I personally don't think it is necessary to pass the exam. I didn't take any course, but did take the exams seperately (which I do highly recommend) and was able to pass on the first try. It seems that the AEI course relies a lot on the binders of material they give you which have shortcuts and tables that you can utilize to essentially solve problems faster. The problem is, for the CBT, you can't bring these binders in anymore. I don't know how they have changed the course since the change, but in my opinion, there are 2 really effective ways to prepare for the SE exam:

1)Solve practice problems.
2)Become intimately familiar with every code book.

By solving problems over and over (especially within the time constraints of the exam) this will help you practice flipping through the codes and thinking through problems quickly. By knowing the codes from cover to cover, and knowing where all of the sections are, no matter what problem shows up, you know where to go immediately. The biggest challenge with the SE is just the time. You have to be quick, which means you don't have time to search for where something is. You have to know where it is.

@Rsd789, Concerns about the steel lateral are valid, but if you take the time to go through the steel seismic design manual it actually isn't too bad. There were a few problems on the morning portion that were pretty basic and then one of the afternoon questions had a steel building. I wouldn't say the exam had a large portion of steel though. I was similar to you with doing a few projects in SDC C but those were usually wood projects, so the seismic steel was a little new. The way they lay out the steel seismic design manual I think is pretty helpful. They have step by step descriptions of many of the problems that they would ask you in the exam.

At the end of the day, I think studying and taking the test was worth it, but it sure was painful during that process. No matter the pain and frustrations of the exam and studying, nothing beats the satisfaction at the end knowing you passed one of the more difficult professional exams out there and propelled yourself into the top of your profession!

 

[HDStructural]

Stenbrook,
I appreciate your comments. I already had a strong foundation of the gravity stuff from my work and school experience. If you aren't familiar with the 4 different materials and their codes already, I would agree that gravity first is probably the way to go. Historically, the lateral test is harder than gravity although as you noted, that isn't always the case.

 

[strucbells]

I took the pen & paper gravity/buildings SE Exam in 2022 and lateral/buildings in 2023 and passed each on the first try. Started in structural engineering as an EI in 2014, but didn't have a ton of high seismic building work experience going into the exam. Would recommend doing them apart like that as both parts were mentally exhausting 8 hour days (not to mention hand cramps from writing the depth sections), I can't imagine studying for both and then doing them on back to back days.

I took the PPI review course for gravity and AEI for lateral. The AEI lateral course was a lot more organized and had a lot more homework/workshop problems/mini exams etc than the PPI gravity class. I would recommend the AEI courses based on my experience with it, especially if you are not well practiced in seismic design and detailing, they do a good job of explaining the various systems to the degree needed for the exam.

Obviously the format is different now with the 4 computer based tests, but I think a similar approach makes sense (do them separately).