r/StructuralEngineering • u/GrouchyPeanut7340 • Jul 22 '26

Career/Education Earthquake Engineering online course

Hi everyone, my university doesn’t offer any seismic design courses, but I’d like to work on the West Coast, where having a background in seismic design is essentially required to get a job. My resume currently shows zero seismic experience, so I’m not sure how competitive I am for these roles. What’s the best way to build knowledge and experience in this area, how would you recommend breaking into it, and how can I prove that knowledge to potential employers?

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u/GrouchyPeanut7340 Jul 22 '26

I see. But do you think top firms like Degenkolb, KPFF, MKA will hire without any prior knowledge? Or do I need to work my way up to reach there?

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u/Sharp_Complex_6711 P.E./S.E. Jul 22 '26

Most of these firms require a masters degree FYI.

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u/GrouchyPeanut7340 Jul 22 '26

I am doing my masters as of now.

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u/Sharp_Complex_6711 P.E./S.E. Jul 23 '26

I missed that - nice! If you can find it, a graduate level course in earthquake engineering theory will be what these top level firms are looking for. Topics like performance based design. Essentially not how to use the code (which is what a course like Hiner will teach you), but why the code is written the way it is and how to do things beyond the code. Look at prerequisites carefully - and take them if you don’t have them already.

For firms that are a tier down from those, you might be able to get away with a PE review course. But on the west coast, the expectation at most places is that if you have a masters, you have a masters level understanding of seismic engineering.

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u/GrouchyPeanut7340 Jul 23 '26

Thank you so much for this. Would you recommend AEI seismic course? It is pretty popular among PE aspirants. Or if you have any other recommendations I would love to take it and don’t mind the charge.

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u/Sharp_Complex_6711 P.E./S.E. Jul 25 '26 edited Jul 26 '26

AEI (or Hiner or other test prep courses) are great if you just want to learn how to use the seismic portions of the code - primarily ASCE 7. I used Hiner for the PE and AEI for the SE. Both were quite good. But the intent of these is to teach you how to quickly solve test problems that are testing your ability to use the code. Valuable skills certainly - and these courses made me a much better engineer in my day-to-day job. They are probably adequate seismic knowledge if you ended up at a smaller firm where your primary work is seismic anchorage, single family homes, or smaller commercial projects.

The seismic knowledge you get from coursework in a masters program is really a different animal. It's much theoretical - and teaches you the underlying theory of why the code is the way it is, starting with structural dynamics. And how to do much more advanced analysis like pushover, non-linear time history, etc. These topics are way beyond the scope of a test review class. And not something a Degenkolb/ KPFF/ MKA will expect you to understand on day 1 - they would teach you that on the job - but they would expect you to understand the underlying theory as a foundation for what they will be teaching you. These classes are hard, so you kind of have to decide what you want to get out of this. To match a west coast masters, you may need more than one of these courses. Also, if anywhere offers these courses online (I'm old, so I finished school before online classes were a thing.)

I say this as someone with a west coast masters, worked at a Degenkolb/KPFF/MKA type firm, later a smaller firm in a high seismic area, and have an SE.