I am reading a lot of post encouraging a “try try” again approach, despite the fact that these same post disclose that you prepared, understood the material, scored highly on practice questions/exams, and perhaps even scored higher the first time around. Well written exams reflect peoples depth and breadth of knowledge - not reading comprehension, ability to spot ‘trick’ questions, etc A well written exam will also reflect the correct underlying distribution. Strong quants who understand the material should score high on quant. Case in point, coworker scored number one on the cqf/ harvard math grad/ current/ experienced/ very prepared (did not 'blow off the math section because ‘he knew it’). he failed this section (and the test). This points to the larger issue in which i am not seeing addressed in this forum. How can we respect an exam that does not reflect the knowledge of the test taker. It is analogous to timing a race with a malfunctioning clock. Do you keep running the race, until the clock happens to spit out the winning time? I have the base knowledge, the discipline, the credentials (abd berkeley economics, college teaching experience, work experience, preparation, prior test taking experiences, etc. etc., (yeah, this covers decades, i’m old). I can accept a ‘fail’ but not the inconsistency. I can accept that I did not know everything in depth (i did not), but again, this is not my point. My point is the apparent randomness of the results. So to my point. If we pay for something, in time, effort, and money, don’t we deserve to get receive an exam that reflects the underlying distribution, and our understanding and ability to apply these concepts? Am I missing something, or shoud the CFA institute take a hard look at their process? Don’t we deserve this? Isn’t this what their ‘ethics’ is all about? If all these repeat ‘offenders’ put that much effort towards their careers themselves, rather than an exam … ?
respectfully disagree. trick questions- which ones do you think were tricks? the r squared question? there were 3 answer choices. one distractor answer, then the positive and negative number which was the sq root of r squared. shame on you or shame on me also in this case for not looking at the regression equation and realizing that the 2 were negatively correlated. if it were a positive correlation and the answer were simply the positive number, then 90% of test takers would’ve gotten it right. if it were a gimmie question, then the MPS would go up a ton, they’d leave pass rates alone, but you’d need to score an 80% to pass. on the flip side- if you wanted straight forward but harder, you’d have to include some very hard math questions. this might bump up against time constraints. the way the CFAI tests is a bit tricky and it does take some time to get used to. i don’t think that there were that many “trick” type questions on the test though. similarly, testing smaller areas might seem tricky vs. some of the CFAI mock tests, but overall, looking at the full body of the test, i’d say that 75% of the test if not more was the larger topics. AI- tested PE and was straightforward Equity- was pretty straight shooting topic-wise FSA- this year was a bit fringe with accrual ratios, etc, but there were 4 item sets- i’d say in total no more than 1 was more a fringe set. CF- was very straightforward this year FI- was fairly straightforward. the overcollateralization question was deceptively easy and “tricky”, but heck, that’s 1 question out of 12. Derivs- it is quite possibly the most straightforward section of the test. you can value a swap or you can’t. the calcs here weren’t awful if you could do swaps/futures. the 1 q on that weird one with coupons was weird- ok fine, 1 out of 12 complete weirdo left field. etc… we could go on look at the whole test, but the CFAI has to test like 20-25% of more oddball topics. otherwise, how would they differentiate that much between candidates? everyone who takes this level should know FCFF/FCFE cold. if you don’t, shame on you. if it shows up and you know it, good for you. if it doesn’t show up, oh well. you can’t whine that you learned it and spent time on it. EVERYONE did. it’s a given. those are the topics that you have to know b/c if they show up and you pass up on them, you’re so far dead. but even if you know them, you’re not a lock. you then have to go and out of that 25% of fringe stuff, go master enough so that come test day, your topics hit or you have at least enough to get by on these without huge damage done. i don’t understand how someone can say that the test wasn’t fair. it was fair. all candidates took the same test. all are given the same tools. some perform, some don’t. there are some freak things like a dinesh in '08 or CPK in '09 not getting through, but i can promise you that CPK will pass this coming year. he knows now what he’s up against and he’ll crush it. retakers, just suck it up at this point. you’re going to have to take it again. not the end of the world. use the fact that you’ve seen the test and know what you’re up against to your advantage. study and know what you need to know to win when you do battle next year. the CFAI has a fairly similar testing style year over year in terms of big topics, small ones, and common trap type answers that you need to avoid. learn them, live them, love them. ethics also- they test the grey-er stuff, but if you go back and read the handbook again and again, most aren’t so grey. just small stuff that if you don’t have at your fingertips, it seems grey. i don’t question the integrity of the test. just like when it rained in college and i was a D1 ballplayer, i didn’t question the integrity of the field conditions. we all play on the same field. you learn to adjust to the game or the game plays you. learn from it, relax, stop whining, and just study enough to pass it next time. not a crazy formula to success really. know more than the guy next to you. a lot more.
I agree with you charterchaser. The test is very random and not necessarily indicative of your preparation or knowledge. I put in probably over 500 hours and never got below 70 on a practice test (half my tests were above 80). But no one is forcing us to do this. We are all choosing this designation because of the respect, knowledge, and possible career opportunities it can afford us in the future. So it may not be fair, but we don’t have a choice. And when I say fair, I am not talking about exam conditions as bannisja is referring to. We all took the same test under the same conditions. But what is not fair is the actual testing of knowledge. Let’s say I have two Quant vignettes, and I took them back to back. One vignette I might get 100% and the other I might get 50%. Which score is truly a reflection of my knowledge? Maybe for the 50% one I got 2 wrong because I slightly misinterpreted the wording of the question. Is this a reflection of my knowledge or a simple game of luck? I would say a combination of both, but don’t underestimate the luck factor. I am not whining either. I am just speaking my opinion. I am studying next year again. And when I actually saw the FAIL on 8/18, I wasn’t even really that down about it oddly enough. I failed L1 once and I guess I’ve been toughened up by that experience.
And to expand on my earlier point about us not having a choice… This is just the way CFAI is going to test us. Let’s say you start dating a new beautiful girl, but she keeps stealing $1 bills from your wallet. Is this fair? No, but you are choosing to date her so there’s no sense in complaining. If it bothers you that much, you can choose to stop dating her. But you inevitably want to keep dating her because she is a supermodel who treats you well in all other ways and it will help your future (let’s say she comes from a billionaire family and this will greatly enrich your life). Anyway, that’s my random analogy for the day.
you’ll rock it topher. have full faith in your skills and sorry to hear you didn’t clear it this time around. i’ve gone fail/pass/fail/pass so far on tests, so i don’t claim to be the brightest or hardest worker here by any stretch. just learn from the mistakes and you’ll rock it this time. L2 sux in that there’s just too much material- all can’t be tested- and given a lot of luck factors, you may or may not hit on your good spots depending on what’s tested. you have to be ready i guess so when your bad stuff comes up, you still have enough to get by. easier said that done, but if you focus on your weaker spots, i promise the 2nd time around goes a LOT faster and isn’t as painful. on the plus side aside from just the pass/fail, you’ll know your stuff well. i know that isn’t as good as a pass, but in my slow paced trek to get the charter, i do feel like by the time i put in the right amount of hours and it’s my 2nd go around, i really do know most of the stuff pretty well.
topher Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > And to expand on my earlier point about us not > having a choice… > > This is just the way CFAI is going to test us. > Let’s say you start dating a new beautiful girl, > but she keeps stealing $1 bills from your wallet. > Is this fair? No, but you are choosing to date her > so there’s no sense in complaining. If it bothers > you that much, you can choose to stop dating her. > But you inevitably want to keep dating her because > she is a supermodel who treats you well in all > other ways and it will help your future (let’s say > she comes from a billionaire family and this will > greatly enrich your life). > > Anyway, that’s my random analogy for the day. pics or she doesnt exist
Why do people have to keep bringing up that d*mn correlation coefficient question? I’ve been trying to forget about it since I realized from this forum that I fell for the sucker answer… But seriously it sounds to me like maybe the original poster has spent a little too much time on the Berkley campus (which is a wonderful place btw). I’m going to fall back on the biggest cliche in book i.e. life isn’t fair. It’s kind of like storming into your boss’s office after he hires his nitwit son/nephew/whatever for the job you wanted and explaining to him/her that a “fair” hiring process would probe “peoples depth and breadth of knowledge” and assign jobs accordingly as opposed to some arbitrary system based on nepotism and connections. Top it off by questioning his/her commitment to “ethics” that he/she is always spouting off about…and oh yeah have a nice time in the unemployment line. Sucks? Yep. Is what it is? Also yep. And just like employment is “work at will” the CFA is “take at will”. You not only volunteered for the torture but you paid for it. If it’s such an affront to your personal belief system then vote with what counts i.e. your money.
thanks for the points, would be interested to hear more. please do not confuse my questioning with ‘whining’. i have no issues with retaking, as a matter in fact, one plus of retaking is to really have an opportunity to really own this material, to benefit my value in my work. one comment. my ‘fair comment’ was more in line with tophers view. not simply ‘same test, same conditions’. rather 1. is the test reliable? But what is not fair is the actual testing of knowledge. Let’s say I have two Quant vignettes, and I took them back to back. One vignette I might get 100% and the other I might get 50%. Which score is truly a reflection of my knowledge? Maybe for the 50% one I got 2 wrong because I slightly misinterpreted the wording of the question. Is this a reflection of my knowledge or a simple game of luck? I would say a combination of both, but don’t underestimate the luck factor. i think topher picked up on this here. you want an exam that if you take it one year, and get a 50, study much harder the next year, and get a 40, that is not an indicator of reliability. 2. is the test valid? this is to my point on the math guy. it measures the usefulness of the test as a measure of knowledge, and predictor. a person who is strong in math should be expected to score high on the quant section. 3. standardization. who is passing this? to whom am i being measured. are the passers mainly retakers? this is where transparency would help from the institute. not science, just my thoughts.
I don’t think that any test I’ve taken have ever assessed my true knowledge in the subject it was testing. I find that exam technique is almost as important as the knowledge of the subject. To an extent I do agree with what you are saying but I wouldn’t question the integrity of the exam, more the philosophy of testing and examinations.
I feel the same. The test is not reliable or fair in determining your body of knowledge. If you fail one year and then put in a massive amount of effort and know it better, even if you fail again, you should fail in a higher band, not like all these stories we have been reading. Whatever you get in your practice exams before the exam is no indicator that you will do well or not on the actual test. It’s ridiculous, there is a tremendous dependency on your luck factor to pass and a well designed test system should be more dependent on a candidate’s preparedness and knowledge not luck. They should take a bigger sample of questions to rectify it. The fact that CFAI won’t open themselves to showing the answers they think are correct adds to their lack of credibility in a very non-transparent system that has a lot to hide. You are joining a cult and will be beaten at will until they decide with randomness to let you pass.
bannisja Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > respectfully disagree. > >… > > i don’t question the integrity of the test. just > like when it rained in college and i was a D1 > ballplayer, i didn’t question the integrity of the > field conditions. we all play on the same field. > you learn to adjust to the game or the game plays > you. learn from it, relax, stop whining, and just > study enough to pass it next time. not a crazy > formula to success really. know more than the guy > next to you. a lot more. +1 The test is difficult but fair. I think where we go wrong is thinking that a person with a ton of work experience, has the degrees and education to practically write the test should in no doubt pass. The CFAI doesn’t grade us on what we’ve done or what we know, they grade us on what they want us to know. I take them for their word when they say they don’t test for anything outside of the curriculum given and if you believe that then the test should be rather fair. Furthermore, I believe we absolutely should respect the charter b/c it represents the ability to understand, learn, and regurgitate the information given. This is not representative of the different types of learning and intelligence out there but it is representative of a trait that will help us be successful in our profession. Of course the caveat is the charter is by no mean necessary for success, it’s rather just another path to it. Just my two cents. My buddy who’s getting a doctorate in education would have much more to say about the problems of standardized testing.
“The fact that CFAI won’t open themselves to showing the answers they think are correct adds to their lack of credibility in a very non-transparent system that has a lot to hide” +1 This that Nep-hi said does annoy me about the test. There are maybe 5-10 questions on that test where I will NEVER know the answer. Mature/transitional, the derivs PV - FVC one, one or 2 ethics q’s, maybe even the H model one with D0 or D1 (although i was perfectly content accepting my -1 for my D0 answer, my guess is they gave credit to both), contango vs normal contango, etc. I wish they would publish answers to the exams. Or use last year’s exam as the free mock. That would be valuable closure.
bannisja Wrote: “There are maybe 5-10 questions on that test where I will NEVER know the answer. Mature/transitional, the derivs PV - FVC one, one or 2 ethics q’s, maybe even the H model one with D0 or D1 (although i was perfectly content accepting my -1 for my D0 answer, my guess is they gave credit to both), contango vs normal contango, etc.” +1 Will CFAI ever grow the ethics to take ownership for their questions and answers? You can’t even learn from these obscure yet simple questions to not fall into the same trap again. Each question is worth too much to have this much debate when even looking into the CFAI text doesn’t make it any clearer and it’s the only source we have.
I happen to agree with the major theme of this thread-there are other variables that will impact your fate over and above studying the material. I thought I passed for sure and there were many others who failed that knew the material better than I did. Unfortunately, I don’t see CFAI releasing any test questions so we can find out where we went wrong. Personally, this would all be easier to deal with if we could test in December, but that is also a pipe dream. We’re stuck and we just have to deal with it. I got my books the other day; I only went through them to see if there were any significant changes. I’ll pick them up in December and keep going until June5, 2010.
I will take it one step further. Not only publish the answers but also provide each individual the copy of their answer sheet along with the result. Full disclosure. If the idea of the institute not disclosing the marks is to not distinguish among CFA’s, then that does not hold even today since people who pass the exam in first attempt are allowed to say that. Does it not distinguish the retakers already?
I’m certainly not questioning the integrity of the test. Your questions are legitimate and I definitely do not think of it as ‘whining’. Here’s my take on your concerns charterchaser. The point of the test is about the folks who pass the test. - If you fail the test, you are still the smart and successful person that you are. - If you pass the test, you are still the smart and successful person that you are and you have some fresh proof of this fact that other people can rely on. Failing the test does not mean anything. You can think of this like hypothesis testing with the following Null and alternate hypotheses: H0: You are not knowledgeable enough to clear L2 vs. Ha: You are knowledgeable enough to clear L2 Now your attempt at L2 is a sample of all areas of knowledge required to clear L2 and your result is a mean value of the knowledge you demonstrated across the areas in the sample. A result (mean value) of Fail indicates that we do not have sufficient evidence to reject H0 - that is CFAI does not know whether you are knowledgeable enough to clear L2. A result (mean value) of Pass indicates that we do have sufficient evidence to reject H0 -that is CFAI knows you are knowledgeable enough to clear L2. Note that we always either reject H0 or do not reject H0. We are never trying to accept H0 - we are never trying to say a person is not knowledgeable to clear L2, only that there’s not sufficient evidence to counter it. Reliability: The test IS reliable because if a person passes the test, we can reject H0 and say that he/ she is knowledgeable enough to clear L2 with a certain degree of confidence. The reliability matters only when your result is a ‘Pass’ because if your result is ‘Fail’ there’s nothing that can be said about the person’s knowledge of L2 (Think how ridiculous it would sound if some one says - “Oh you failed L2? You must be pathetic”). The fact that you cannot say anything about the candidate who failed the test directly correlates with Standard VII B which requires that no distinction is to be made between a candidate that passed the test in the first try to a candidate who passed after several attempts. This is exactly why the test is reliable because CFAI acknowledges the fact that passing in the first attempt does not in anyway make your pass superior to another person’s pass after multiple attempts. As long as you passed an employer or a client can rely on your knowledge. Validity: Again the test measures the candidate who passes it. The test is valid because anyone who passes it must be reasonably strong in Quant for instance. Not the other way round that anyone who’s strong in Quant should automatically pass the test (for example: I might be extremely strong in Quant and still fail because I was under extreme emotional stress as my girlfriend broke up with me and threw me out of the house the previous night - folks this did not happen, please do not post your sympathies :-)). Passing the test is a VALID proof of your knowledge. Standardization: It does not matter who is taking the test - it is a new test every time. You answered this yourself with your first question - you can study hard, know everything and fail with a 50% the first time and then study hard and fail again the next time with 40%. It is a new test, a new sample of the body of knowledge every time. You dont have to measure yourself against who’s passing the test. You have to measure yourself with - do you have sufficient knowledge to score more than 70% in every section. Theoretically everyone who takes the test can absolutely pass the test if they answered all the questions correctly !!!
You are joining a cult and will be beaten at will until they decide with randomness to let you pass. that’s beautiful. thank you.
There’s no doubt that the CFA exams are conducted in a very sketchy manner. Consider that the CFAI: 1) Does not release past examinations to the public and prohibits anyone from talking about details of past exams. 2) Does not release individual candidate scores for each section or for the entire exam. 3) Does not disclose the passing score. 4) Does not disclose how they determine the passing score. (Sure they claim to have “experts” look at each question, but that doesn’t really give us any information.) Their procedure is a black box. Even if they do something that is unfair, it’s impossible for us to know what it is. But of course, all of us knew this and decided to take the exams anyway. So, I guess there’s little point in complaining.
Dudes, dudes, dudes…well and dudettes… I’d love to see my exam and argue questions with the CFAI. Geez, I’ve probably added a half a grade point to my transcript over the years arguing partial credit with profs. Buuuut at the end of the day it’s a private organization and they’re free to conduct their business however they’d like. I’d also like Charter to let me buy ala carte, give me a discount for opting out of flyers for services I already have, and post prices on their website. Aaaaand that’s going nowhere either. None of CFAI’s practices kept a secret from anybody and (unless I missed something) they never guaranteed that every smart, educated, hardworking person would pass even with X# of study hours.
> we could go on look at the whole test, but the > CFAI has to test like 20-25% of more oddball > topics. otherwise, how would they differentiate > that much between candidates? I totally agree with this. But I am not sure if I agree whether it should be 10-15% or as much as 20-25%. For level I, I ignored the trivia stuff but I made sure that I know the core concepts cold. I think the level 1 exam only had 10-15% trivia stuff, so I passed comfortably. I am hoping that the same strategy can work for level 2. Another thing that was surprising is the fact that many people are shocked at the content of the real exam. This means that the sample exams and the mock exam are not representative of the real exam. If CFAI plans to include 20-25% oddball topics in the real exam, probably they should have done the same for the mock exam so that candidates don’t complain. bannisja Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > respectfully disagree. > > trick questions- which ones do you think were > tricks? the r squared question? there were 3 > answer choices. one distractor answer, then the > positive and negative number which was the sq root > of r squared. shame on you or shame on me also in > this case for not looking at the regression > equation and realizing that the 2 were negatively > correlated. if it were a positive correlation and > the answer were simply the positive number, then > 90% of test takers would’ve gotten it right. if > it were a gimmie question, then the MPS would go > up a ton, they’d leave pass rates alone, but you’d > need to score an 80% to pass. on the flip side- > if you wanted straight forward but harder, you’d > have to include some very hard math questions. > this might bump up against time constraints. the > way the CFAI tests is a bit tricky and it does > take some time to get used to. i don’t think that > there were that many “trick” type questions on the > test though. similarly, testing smaller areas > might seem tricky vs. some of the CFAI mock tests, > but overall, looking at the full body of the test, > i’d say that 75% of the test if not more was the > larger topics. > AI- tested PE and was straightforward > Equity- was pretty straight shooting topic-wise > FSA- this year was a bit fringe with accrual > ratios, etc, but there were 4 item sets- i’d say > in total no more than 1 was more a fringe set. > CF- was very straightforward this year > FI- was fairly straightforward. the > overcollateralization question was deceptively > easy and “tricky”, but heck, that’s 1 question out > of 12. > Derivs- it is quite possibly the most > straightforward section of the test. you can > value a swap or you can’t. the calcs here weren’t > awful if you could do swaps/futures. the 1 q on > that weird one with coupons was weird- ok fine, 1 > out of 12 complete weirdo left field. > etc… > > we could go on look at the whole test, but the > CFAI has to test like 20-25% of more oddball > topics. otherwise, how would they differentiate > that much between candidates? everyone who takes > this level should know FCFF/FCFE cold. if you > don’t, shame on you. if it shows up and you know > it, good for you. if it doesn’t show up, oh well. > you can’t whine that you learned it and spent > time on it. EVERYONE did. it’s a given. those > are the topics that you have to know b/c if they > show up and you pass up on them, you’re so far > dead. but even if you know them, you’re not a > lock. you then have to go and out of that 25% of > fringe stuff, go master enough so that come test > day, your topics hit or you have at least enough > to get by on these without huge damage done. > > i don’t understand how someone can say that the > test wasn’t fair. it was fair. all candidates > took the same test. all are given the same tools. > some perform, some don’t. there are some freak > things like a dinesh in '08 or CPK in '09 not > getting through, but i can promise you that CPK > will pass this coming year. he knows now what > he’s up against and he’ll crush it. > > retakers, just suck it up at this point. you’re > going to have to take it again. not the end of > the world. use the fact that you’ve seen the test > and know what you’re up against to your advantage. > study and know what you need to know to win when > you do battle next year. the CFAI has a fairly > similar testing style year over year in terms of > big topics, small ones, and common trap type > answers that you need to avoid. learn them, live > them, love them. ethics also- they test the > grey-er stuff, but if you go back and read the > handbook again and again, most aren’t so grey. > just small stuff that if you don’t have at your > fingertips, it seems grey. > > i don’t question the integrity of the test. just > like when it rained in college and i was a D1 > ballplayer, i didn’t question the integrity of the > field conditions. we all play on the same field. > you learn to adjust to the game or the game plays > you. learn from it, relax, stop whining, and just > study enough to pass it next time. not a crazy > formula to success really. know more than the guy > next to you. a lot more.