The P.E. Exam

by Susanna Solomon

“What are you doing?” the white-haired man asked. His wife, sitting beside him, clicked her purse open and hunted inside.

As for me, four books were spread out on a table along with binders, a cheat sheet, and a notebook. We were at a Red Lion in Sacramento, the night before my P.E. exam.

“Studying, why?” I asked. More than ten years ago, in a miserable marriage, I had seen engineering as a ticket out and went back to school. Fourteen years older than all the other students in my first algebra class, I had had to ignore our age difference if I was going to focus. Now I was forty-one, working in a decent job, divorced, and starting my career late. I had had to work in four places before they stopped asking me if I could type.

“Studying for what?” He leaned forward.

“My P.E. exam,” I said proudly.

“P.E. as in physical education? They have exams for that?”

“Uh, no. Professional Engineer,” I answered, not feeling like moving. My papers were everywhere.

“For you?” he sneered. His wife, dressed in a blue suit with a white scarf, clicked her purse shut.

“Yes, yes, of course for me,” I answered. “I’m an engineer.”

He snorted.

It had taken me two years to get employment verification records and another two to persuade professional electrical engineers to write the five references the exam required. My bosses at the time had refused on both counts. I was in a new job and things looked bright. All I needed was my P.E..

“What do you want to be an engineer for? Women don’t become engineers.”            

“But I am,” I said. “I need to study here.”

The man’s wife lifted her eyebrows. “Harold.”

“In my day,” he went on, “we didn’t have any ‘girl’ engineers. You’re taking a job away from a man.”

 “Sir,” I said, my hands poised over my 350 page study handbook. “I need to review my notes.” I’d heard the same crap for years from my mother-in-law and I still hated her for it. The stats were the same as when I’d started, ten percent of all engineers were women. Ten years later, it hadn’t budged.

“Don’t waste your time, you’ll never pass,” he said, sitting back on the overstuffed chair and looking satisfied. His wife looked upon him with a frown.

It was late October. I’d spent the last six months studying – on top of a full time job and being a single mom. I’d started at four hours a week studying and was now up to twenty. I’d taken a course at U.C. Berkeley, I’d had a study group, I’d worked on problems every moment I could, even while camping. For seven years I’d studied engineering, graduating with highest honors. But his words still affected me. The eight hour exam had a 22% pass rate.

“Go on home, don’t even bother.”

“Harold, leave the poor girl alone,” Harold’s wife nudged her husband and they left.

He was right. I had no right to even try. I was a dunderhead, I knew nothing – all the formulas I’m crammed into my head the last few months fell out with a rush. My notes looked like worms. I couldn’t retain a thing.

Shaken, I walked over to a pay phone and called my best friend. “Am I doing the right thing?” I asked, hesitating. “Forget what he said, you’ll do fine.”

Feeling encouraged, I packed all my notes and headed upstairs to relax. A show about Marian Anderson was on. As she sang ‘Ave Maria’ in front of the Lincoln Memorial for 75,000 people, I wept. She was outside because the Daughters of the American Revolution had refused to let her sing in Constitution Hall. If she could do it, so could I.

The next morning I, along with 400 other hopefuls, lined up at Cal Expo in a driving rain with our books and drivers licenses out, waiting for admission. The exam was the hardest test I had taken in my life. Thrice in the morning I didn’t think I’d pass, and in the middle of the afternoon I almost gave up. Seven years of science and math, an eight hour prep exam, the EIT, the endless requesting for references, the studying and Harold’s voice kept me in my seat. I walked out, ready to write a check for the next try.

Four months later I received a call from Bob, a friend who had taken the exam with me, and who had told me at lunch that it was easy. He was at exam headquarters in Sacramento. I listened, sitting forward, preparing to congratulate him. He paused. “I wasn’t on the list,” he said, and was quiet a moment, “but you were.”

I had passed.