When I took L1, I felt that the material provided by the CFAI (Books, EOCs, Mocks) did a good job preparing me for the actual exam. As such, when I took the test, I felt familiar with the concepts, the level of difficulty, and the way the questions were presented.
This, however, was not at all how I felt about L2. To a lagre degree (50%+) I feel like the CFAI material did not prepare me for the actual exam. Of course, the concepts are all the same, but my main frustration comes from the way the CFAI prepared me to be tested versus how I was actually tested. To this regard, it is my personal view that the Institute somewhat deceived its candidates by 1) diverting our attention away from testable topics 2) not providing within the CFAI material the kinds of problems that are actually tested 3) not providing sufficient problems within the CFAI material to learn how the CFAI expects its candidates to analyze information.
This is primairly a self-study program. We rely almost exclusively on what the CFAI provides, and we develop problem solving methods based around their learning materials. Additionally, we gauge what we should focus on, and the level of difficulty of the topics based on their information.
I did not think the provided materials coincided well with the exam, and for this I am disappointed with the CFA Program. I find this a fallacy in how the Institute creates its Charter holders and I think the level of ambiguity on the exam lowers the Institute’s credibility.
I’m not sure how the the materials didn’t prepare you for the exam. I felt I benefitted a great deal from the end-of-chapter questions while I was writing the exam itself. I did those chapter questions at least five or six times per reading throughout my studies.
I agree with the original poster in that the CFAI L1 curriculum had much better EOC questions. The L2 EOC questions were either too much on one particular topic (which I’m not complaining about), or too little, or no testing questions on other topics. Certain chapters had absolutely no EOC questions at all. This was my second time taking L2. I Passed L1 in Dec '10, and did the quick turn to L2 in Jun '11. With only 3.5 months, I relied on Schweser, and failed Band 9. This time, I used 9 months to study, reading the entire CFAI curriculum (FRA x2), and doing all EOC questions twice. I honestly felt MORE prepared the first time I took the test, but after taking the test, felt I did better this time. Take that for what it is worth.
I used CFAI after passing L1 in Dec, but finished readings only 2 weeks before the exam, and didn’t feel quite prepared because I only did about 3 practice exams. I however did all EOC questions, some twice, and feel like I did get some of the oddball questions right that were buried in the CFAI material. I got a late start in Jan becuase CFAI did not report scores until late January, and I don’t think that was enough time to read 3000 pages and do all the EOCs. Overall, CFAI is good for understanding the concepts, good on EOC questions, but is a bit too long to cover in 3 months without having time to review at the end.
I agree with the original poster that the CFAI provided materials did not closely conicide with the material emphasized or the style of the actual exam.
Honestly I dont feel I learn quite a lot from doing EOC for a few reasons:
-Not all EOC is vignette style.
-The level of difficulty is not matched with mock and real exam
-So few vignette for you to practice and solve problem from many perspectives.
I do feel that doing mock and practice exams of Schwswer help my learning curve a great deal, with lots of twist and trick. That prepares you to look carefully onto the questions
I think the EOC’s are pretty basic, and getting though them are good for getting the concepts down.
What would be better though is if CFAI through in some exam style questions with the EOC’s ( i think even the vignette q’s in the books are straighforward), which require you to interpret and analyse info and concepts in different ways. I suppose it also help in building problem-solving/analytical skills more than anything else.
So yeah i think there is a big gap in the way the study material is presented and the actual test, that’s the way I felt at least.
Do the mocks. They helped me to prepare better than any EOC or Schwesher quiz questions. Just do mocks over and over, open book and untimed, at first, but timed and closed book as you get closer to the exam. After 20 sessions of mocks (10 exams), you’ll feel so prepared, you’re gonna think you can ace it.
I am going to try to answer most of the above posts, although not in order.
First, I am very certain that I did not under estimate the level of dificulty of L2. I prepared well, and had raised my Mock scores to a high 70 range. I think a few comments are confused with what my main focus is. I do agree that the CFAI material is helpful. If I had walked into the L2 exam without reading, doing EOC, or practicing Mocks I would have been clueless. In that regard, the CFAI material does provide the concepts and does provide examples of how the concepts are used, both of which are helpful.
My focus is whether the style of the questions provided by the CFAI for prep coincide with the style of questions that are offered on the actual exam, wheter the method of working through CFAI provided problems complement how one would analyze and work through acutal exam questions, and whether the material emphasized on the CFAI mateiral (especially the most recent Mocks) did a good job of helping candidates narrow down topical foucs.
As an example, the CFAI materials are very text book in nature. The EOCs follow that text book process. Does the actual exam follow the same text book process? Think back to the 2012 Mocks. How much of the material emphasized on the mocks showed up on the actual exam? Do you think the CFAI provided a Mock that accurately reflected the tested topics, and to what extent? Did they accurately represent the exam and the tricky questions, or do you think some of your attention was diverited on to subjects that wasted your time and energy?
Obviously I am not looking for specific details; I want candidates to look at this from a broad perspective.
Finally, at Alladin- I don’t believe that the CFAI is out to make money. Correct me if I am wrong, but this is a Not for Profit Org. Additionally, flunking candidates in order to make profits would be out of line with the Institute’s values and ethics. I imagine large lawsuits would line up if one were to determine otherwise. Credibility would be destroyed and the CFA designation would be worth very little. This is global organization and I doubt many charter holders would allow such a scheme.
The older i get (and perhaps also more cynical) the more i think that Captain Jack Sparrow said it best : ‘There are only two things in the world, what a man can do and what a man cannot do’. At the end of the day, an exam is meant to seperate candidates not to put them on an equal footing. The ability to be flexible and extract hidden information/unconventional relations from vignettes is a large part of the exam, perhaps at least as important as the actual content examed. IMHO, structuring the EOCs too closely to actual exam questions diminshes this part of the CFA programmme.No one needs me to say this, but in the real world you will be presented with information in such a way that renders ‘text book’ inspired solutions insufficient…just remember guys many ppl have faced the same beast with the same materials before you and many ppl will do the same long after you are gone…approach the curriculum with interest,be disciplined and think about topics from different perspectives…and we will be fine!
I was about to make a long posting as I was reading through this thread, but as I got to the bottom, Alladin’s last post really said everything I wanted to say.
I just want to further point out that I see people like the original poster here, all over the place; in the office, through friends, and of course on internet boards. These people think that the test should be directly proportional to the study they put in. So if they read pages x through y and do z amount of EoC problems, they should automatically be blessed to pass the test. Well, that is not how it works, quit being text book nerds and actually understand the material that they teach you and you should be able to find information throughout the Vignettes that will answer the questions.
After taking the exam it was painfully obvious that every problem, with the exception of the issue that has been mentioned on other threads in these forums that involve the anaylst that is the distant cousin of the New England Patriots Quarterback, could have been deduced with the information given (ok maybe the ethics items were not as easy to deduce without word by word knowledge of the text), with enough UNDERSTANDING of the material.
So quit whining and quit being a typical sore loser who tries to blame it on the CFAI and how they didn’t hold your hand during the test. Man up, if this is your attitude towards an exam, I can only hope that no one will be stupid enough to put you in a position where decisions that affect people and large amounts of money are going to be needed.
If you have any questions about anything I wrote, refer to the post above me by Alladin.
I don’t understand your complaints. The quality of the EOCQ will vary depending on the author, but they are not designed to mimic the exam, nor should they. That’s why you do the practice exam.
Regarding the quantity of questions:
The EOCQ are designed to improve your understanding of the material. This works very well for a lot of chapters, like quant. The material might be foreign to you, but it is very logical. As long as you understand what’s going on, all you need to do is memorize a few key details and a couple of calculations. So the EOCQ are designed in such a way to walk you back through the chapter start to finish. This ensures that you understand the material step by step and reinforces your memory.
This does not work for topics like accounting, which have no logical structure that can be understood. They are pure memorization of formulas/processes.
Because anything in the curriculum is fair game for the exam, there’s really no way around this problem. This also gets to your other point about “diverting” people’s attention from testable topics. This makes no sense. Everything in the curriculum is testable. Everything is fair game. This complaint might be fair about the LOS because the exam sometimes strays slightly outside the LOS, but never outside the curriculum.
In any event, there is nothing particularly special about the vignette format compared to the L1 question format. I did the official mock plus one schweser mock and felt perfectly comfortable with the exam format. As my professor used to say. Multiple choice exams are easy! The correct answer is right there in front of you. All you have to do is circle it.
I mean the real life problem is not going to be labelled FSA/Equity/Alternative Investments with just a vignette, right? If I am not able to clear the test with just this, what will I do with what I learned in real life!
I worked real hard, and obviously dont know if I would pass for sure. But I would be the last one to give an excuse of the CFA books not helping me prepare well. I will work doubly hard next year knowing that my level of understanding and comprehension was not good enough to clear the test.
