Those who felt were adequately prepared for the exam (mostly the AM part):
What type of practice helped most?
EOCs?
BBs?
Past Exams?
CFAI Mocks?
3rd party mocks? Which ones?
Reading and rereading the text and memorizing lists, definitions, justifications?
cant say i was adequately prepared in the AM but i think EOCs and BBs would prepare you best
I also had a feeling that AM test questions (the past ones I did) are very similar to 2-3 BBs combined together.
Yet this year I didn’t have time to review the BBs for a second time, so I just solved the EOCs the last week.
i will tell you after i passed, if not passed i am not eligible to inform you. maybe you passed and i am not again.
Sure we don’t know it, I was trying to gauge the first thoughts, because though the exam happened less than 48 hours ago, I honestly don’t remember 80% of it. But I feel I was not well prepared.
For LII I felt I was well prepared - By “well” I mean in the right way with the right type of practice.
i know what you mean.
i only use the CFAI curriculum from level 1 i started this journey to learn not just to pass, and i don’t see the point of using 3rd source since the exam writers use the curriculum to write the questions, i literally digging the books, take my 45 paid days vacation and 33 unpaid days, read, practice, write, and review i enjoy learning and hope for the best, i didn’t practice any mocks since 7 new readings were added and 6 reading completely have major changes, i manage my time very carefully and find am really long, am and pm directly from the books
Curriculum + Mocks + Previous years’ exams
I’d say curriculum and EOCs (duh!) and the previous year mocks. Regarding 3rd party material…I think Schweser did really sh!tty job preparing for this exam. Having done few of their mocks, I can’t say that they helped me. However, the 4 mocks form Mark Meldrum were absolute life savers.
I am not sure I can say I was adequately prepared (I’d consider one or two active members here qualifies for that, but to be honest, not that many of us will get to that level).
But in terms of best prep for the exam, it would be CFA Eoc plus their past exams. The former to enhance knowledge, the latter to get used to the way questions and answers are structured.
Should I unfortunately fail, I guess I will give MM mocks a shot this time around.
45 paid days vacation + 33 unpaid days? must be nice! [sarcastic font]
I passed last year but I only used Kaplan materials plus the one free CFAI mock. Overall I took 8 practice tests and passed with a decent margin. I recommend Kaplan to everyone I work with, but some of them are big fans of Level Up
Mocks mocks mocks! I did 2003-2018 twice, mm’s mocks, kaplans offline (twice) and online live, konvexity (twice) ift, finquiz and Boston.
A majority of the questions on the exam had a familiar and a some were just replicas of questions I’ve done already. Then you just have to get the hand full of questions that you havent seen.
A lot of mocks as well. I think IFT videos really helped to understand the core of the curriculum alongside reading especially while commuting to work. You can always pause, rewind, and double the speed to go at your pace.
Other than that all the AM mocks you can get hands on, IFT mocks, and CFA PMS, EOCs.
+1 on lots of mocks. First time sitting L3 so don’t know if it has worked yet (obviously!) but despite some surprises in AM content practicing the format and making sure I managed my time well felt really important. This meant mocks without any bathroom breaks or even water on my desk as in the exam you cant just swig away but need to waste precious minutes going to the coolers at the back of the hall. I share the view that the AM format is another study “topic” in its own right and doing mocks to prep is really important.