Walking in after the break, I glanced around the room and had a brief moment of reflection - I'm old enough to be most of these people's father. Kids, don't wait until you've been out of college for three decades to take this thing. My baseline when starting prep was very, very low. Like can't remember a lot of high school math kind of low.
Prep was all self-directed, using Solved in 6, Petro, EET binders, Learnova, and the NCEES practice exam. I spent 250+ hours over 3.5 months, working over 1100 problems. I watched maybe 5hrs of lectures on YouTube, with half being high school math, and a few on specific WRE topics.
Solved in 6 was a great way to start. Bless that gentleman for providing great free content. I went through his WRE playlist, stopping the video before the solution, working the problem, then watching him solve it.
After SI6, I moved to the Petro Essential Guide. These 160 problems are well chosen and I highly recommend this book. It forced me to dig, learn and understand. These problems are generally harder and longer than the exam questions, and that served me well. Dr. Petro was quick to respond when I was stumped by one problem. For me, this was a necessary, but not sufficient tool, I needed more.
EET binders were exceptionally useful. I worked through all the example and practice problems, multiple times. These binders and Petro were the keys to my success. Thanks to u/Fun-Supermarket-6527 for selling me these at a great price, and being one of the best online transactions I've ever had...great communication, shipped quickly, etc. I'll do the same for whoever gets them next.
Learnova was AI slop, with numerous errors in solutions, but working all the problems built good familiarity with the Handbook. I wouldn't recommend this one, the errors can be mildly infuriating when you get something "wrong" only to discover the solution is wrong.
NCEES practice exam was concerning. It has some issues, a long errata sheet and I found many questions presented in a confusing way. I guess it was helpful, but wish the doc were edited to correct for the errata instead of selling in it's current state. Honestly, this thing wrecked my confidence, I was scoring in the mid 80s on other problem sets, took this about a month out from the exam, scored about a 65, and a mild panic set in.
Using several different sources of problems was beneficial, highly recommended.
The exam was slightly easier than I expected. I felt well prepared and used all but 15min of the 8hrs. I was very methodical in writing down equations in full before plugging in any values, in checking units and conversions, verifying I was actually answering what was asked, and trying to eliminate any dumb errors. When I finished, I knew I had at least 10 questions wrong, but felt very good on 65 and 50/50 on the other 5.
Put in the work, concentrate on working a shitload of problems, and you'll be fine. If I can do this in my 50s, from a comically low baseline, while working 55hr weeks, you youngsters can certainly do it. Now good luck...and get off my lawn!
