TECHNICIAN
Elizabeth Moomey Staff Writer
N.C. State engineering students exceeded the national average for the Fundamentals of Engineering exam with the help of a valuable preparation course. The 240 NCSU students who took the exam had a passing rate of 86 percent and exceeded the national passing rate of 70 percent. N.C. State is nationally known for its College of Engineering, and the results of the FE exam validated its reputation. The FE is a huge step toward a career in the engineering field, and is similar to the bar exam taken by law students before becoming a lawyer. It is typically taken by civil, mechanical and environmental engineers because it is often a job requirement. The course, Fundamentals of Engineering exam preparation, E 490, was established more than 15 years ago and has apparently payed off. For the past five years, the scores of N.C. State students have exceeded the national averages, according to the NCEES Institutional Report. J. Ben O’Neal, professor of electrical and computer engineering, teaches portions of the course, and stresses the exams importance. “It helps the students get a better job, at least in the field where it is required for the job,” O’Neal said. The course also allows room for improvement, according to O’Neal.
After students take the exam, they modify the course based on the feedback they receive. Passing the exam also allows people to get a job in public safety, consulting and patent law because a professional engineer license is required. At N.C. State, roughly 450 students take the exam per year compared to the 50,000 people who take it nationally. Nationally, civil engineering majors took the exam the most with more than 4,500 participants in Oct. 2012. Of the 240 test takers at N.C. State, mechanical engineering majors took the exam the most with 89 participants. In Oct. 2012, 9,364 students took the FE exam nationally. Environmental and mechanical engineering students did the best with a pass rate of 92 percent, beating the national average for those majors by 11 percent and 13 percent respectively. According to the NCEES Institutional report, all engineering programs at N.C. State except for aeronautica l engineering had a passing rate greater than the national average. The preparation course is pass/ fail, and is offered during the fall and spring semesters to prepare for the exam in October and April. The class meets 13 times per semester.
january
24 2013
Raleigh, North Carolina
technicianonline.com
N.C. State engineers live up to their reputation
thursday
Local beer jumps to the next level with homegrown hops
PHOTO COURTESY OF ROB AUSTIN
Researchers examine hops being grown for local and national craft breweries as part of the North Carolina Hops Project.
Alexandra Kenney Staff Writer
N.C. State researchers working with the North Carolina Hops Project are learning how to grow local hops for some big name breweries. The project was started by researchers at the University in 2010 and is led by Jeanine Davis, associate professor of horticulture, and Rob Austin, research specialist in soil science. The NCHP was established due to
the booming craft beer industry in North Carolina and the desire for local ingredients by consumers. Most Notably, companies like Sierra Nevada and New Belgium are building brewery sites in North Carolina. Asheville is known as one of the microbrewery capitals of the world, so it is no surprise that there is an interest in growing hops locally in North Carolina. The goal of the project is to pinpoint which hop cultivars are the most
Award-winning journalist Timothy Noah talks about economic inequality
successful in North Carolina and the costs and labor that would be needed to grow hops and sell them. “Ten varieties of hops were selected for research based on three criteria, including popularity with craft breweries, pest and disease resistance and varieties with high yield resistance,” Austin said. Growing hops in the south proved
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Economist predicts local job growth
Tim Gorski Staff Writer
Staff Report Timothy Noah, senior editor of The New Republic, visited campus on Wednesday to discuss the impact of wealth disparity on the 2012 presidential election. Noah, a Harvard graduate, has written for the Wall Street Journal and Newsweek and authored The Great Divergence, a book about income inequality in the United States. The lecture took place Wednesday evening at Poe Hall. Noah discussed a number of issues ranging from the cultural and historical context of financial stratification to the negative repercussions it has on society today. Before discussing the specifics of how wealth disparity influenced the past election, Noah presented an extensive body of statistical evidence and economic terms to establish context. The great divergence refers to an economic trend from 1979 to the present in which the difference between incomes of the top earners in the U.S. to the rest of the population increased. This time frame is juxtaposed to the period known as the great compression, which started during the Great Depression and lasted until 1978. During this time, the gap between the rich and the poor was decreasing. This difference in income levels is often measured in terms of the
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Tim Noah, a senior editor at The New Republic, speaks to students about wealth inequality on Wednesday in Poe Hall. Noah spoke about the growing wealth gap between the rich and the middle class. “The middle class used to prosper when the rest of the country prospered but today it does not.”
Gini index, which provides a unit for dispersion within a set of data such as income. Noah informed the audience that although international economic trends have produced an increase in the Gini index, or an increase in income disparity, there have been notable exceptions, particularly in Latin America. This implies that current financial conditions do not necessarily lead to increasing wealth stratification.
Dangling Loafer brings local comics together See page 5.
Another important term which Noah defined was income mobility. This is the measurement of one’s ability to change their economic status. Noah pointed out that, although the United States has long been considered a country where it is easy to go from rags to riches due to our principles of laissez-faire economics, our ability to do so has fallen far behind that of other countries such as France, Spain, Norway and Finland in recent years.
Noah said the decrease in mobility and the increase in inequality is due to the fact that in recent years, “income growth for top executives is often unrelated to company performance”. He went on to say, “the affluent and wealthy have been prospering where the middle class has not.” These concepts were relevant to the recent presidential elec-
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Gregg displays art for science’s sake See page 6.
viewpoint features classifieds sports
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Michael Walden, N.C. State distinguished professor and extension economist, recently predicted “the Research Triangle will take between 33 percent and 40 percent of all new jobs in North Carolina this year,” according to his interview with the News & Observer. The area, known as RTP and located close to Durham, Raleigh and Chapel Hill, is one of the fastest growing regions in North Carolina, according to an email from Walden. He also mentioned Charlotte. “The Triangle is viewed very positively by businesses due to the available supply of college educated workers, links to university research, competitive land and building costs and access to the growing southeast,” Walden said in an email. Walden stated that these qualities mean job growth in the Triangle is almost twice as high as that of the nation. “The fastest growing jobs will be in professional services, technology, and health care fields,” Walden said in an email. According to the News & Observer, Walden’s predictions aren’t too unlikely due to the growth of the biopharmaceutical field in the area. “Raleigh-Cary has regained about 85 percent of the jobs it lost in the recession, compared to about 44 percent statewide,” the article stated. While the article stated that other economists haven’t all shared his opinion, Walden was confident in his predictions. “North Carolina is improving as the national economy improves,” Walden said in an email. “More jobs mean more spending and incomes in the region. Our regional growth is slower than in the 90s, but better than in the rest of the country.”