I am still quite upset with my band 10 as I did everything to prepare and I just do not know why I failed. Can you please look at my results and give me a feedback. And also do you think it worth retabing?
Many thanks in advance for your time and consideration.
You only scored above 70 for 2 questions in both the AM and again in the PM…and your Ethics score didn’t help you out. Surprised you scored as high as Band 10.
AM session not terrible. Couple more of those PM sections >70% and you would have passed. Of course you want to do better in the AM too, but I would focus on nailing the PM and that could help make up for a less-than-stellar AM.
Without running the numbers it looks like your PM falls in the 60 range, which would make me think there is more of a lack of knowledge rather than an inability to handle the exam structure. How many hours did you study? Did you do all the topic tests on the CFAI website? How many AM papers? Surely there are areas you can improve upon.
^ That is shocking that that is 5 bands lower than his 10. You could argue your matrix looks about the same if not maybe better (the PM is). Those bands really are tight. My only guess is that your <50’s on the AM were closer to zero than 50%.
^Exactly. We’re talking about 3 different ranges: 50%, 20% and 30%.
For example, look at my 2016 CFA level III pass matrix below. The matrix itself looks terrible in the AM, but the matrix doesn’t paint the whole story. I can only speculate that my <50% sections in the AM were very close to 50% and the >70% sections in the PM were perfect to almost perfect. I remember walking out of the exam thinking I got a few of the PM item sets completely correct.
I had a similar matrix to Pretzel Kid in the morning (same section above 70 and 3 sections 50-70 in higher weight subjects) and had all but 2 sections in the PM >70 (one was 50-70 and one <50) and failed band 10. Similar to Pretzel I felt I had got some of the question sets completely right in the afternoon (actually there were only around 4/5 where I didn’t feel that way). But I know I must have bombed some of the morning sessions below 50, remember with the multiple choice questions it is likely even with guessing all 6 questions that you get at least one right (on average you would say 2) but on the constructed response you could easily score 0.
I’m not confused why I’m band 10, I just know that the AM is where I need to improve, I think that is all you can take from the matrix and trying to compare matrices is futile and won’t give you any of the answers you want (which is essentially, “no, you’re right you were a definite pass and 100% you should retab and they will change it for you”, not saying you expect this but this is what we all want having failed).
In regards to advice for how to move from band 10 to a pass, I think as people have said here, your AM isn’t great but it is certainly better than some (a lot) of passing peoples, however your PM is lower than most people who have passed. Seems to me that you have areas that you obviously know very well but there are a few areas which need a bit of sharpening up on. I’d say from your AM you don’t suffer from the format issue that I (and several other people) do so providing you can build on what you have learnt so far I’d say you are in a really good position for next year as you obviously can handle the format of the exam you just need to add to your knowledge which given the foundation of a band 10 shouldn’t be too difficult hopefully.
Your PM got you man. You need to hit 70%+ on the majority of your sections at a minimum. For a comparison, I got 70%+ on all but one section this year. No slight intended, but I agree with both hashtag (yah, I know, right?) that I’m surprised this is a band 10 and another commenter that your PM may indicate you didn’t have a full grasp on the material. Additionally, and I’m not sure if you noticed this, the two AM categories you did well on were the lowest-point total categories.
Failing sucks but you were really close. Hopefully next year is your year.
Since we’re doing this, can anyone critique my result? I was Band 9. I assume that on the essays on which I got less than 50%, I must have scored very low. Thanks.
