FE Civil Passed!
Granted, after failing three times before finally passing, I know a lot of people say this exam is “really easy.” However, having been out of school for four years, relearning the material, getting back into the rhythm of studying, and dealing with the discouragement of previous failed attempts made this process anything but easy for me.
Last night, I was anxious the entire time before opening my NCEES account to see whether I had passed or not. I’m happy to say that I finally passed the FE Civil exam!
In college, I was a decent student — nothing extraordinary. I’m sharing this because if I can pass the FE Civil, then so can you (assuming you graduated from an accredited civil engineering program or are currently in school).
The resources I used were Mark Mattson, Gregory Michaelson, PrepFE, and the NCEES practice exams from the NCEES website. One thing that really helped me was becoming familiar with the FE Reference Handbook — knowing where formulas, concepts, and sections were located made a huge difference during the exam. Also, being comfortable with unit conversions was incredibly helpful.
Most importantly, the biggest change I made compared to my previous attempts was truly understanding why I got practice problems wrong instead of just memorizing solutions. Taking the time to learn from mistakes made all the difference for me. Cheers - upward and onward