It’s like the Wizard of Oz…If you knew that all you had to do is click your heals three times you would get back to Kansas…In the case of the CFA exam, the front of every CFAI text tells you how to prepare for the exam “HOW TO USE THE CFA PROGRAM CURRICULUM” you really need to read it multiple times…especially the section “Tools to Measure Your Comprehension of the Curriculum”. It’s all there, you just have to trust it!!! I believe at some point in the 3 level process everyone comes to the same conclusion. You’re lucky if you get it at level 1. W
AndyPettitteIsGreat Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Your first post stated that you did not feel > entirely confident. Now you are saying you didn’t > think the exam was difficult. > > So you believe it’s there is a 50% chance you’ll > fail an easy exam, and you want to blame > Schweser? > > FWIW, L1 is a complete joke compared to L2 It’s called letting out some frustration after months of studying. Right after the test nobody feels completely confident walking out of the test center, but after going over the questions I was unsure about, it wasn’t as bad as I feared. If I failed Level 1, then it was a learning experience worth learning. If I passed it, I know what to do and what not to do for Level 2. The amount of bitter people on here is astounding though. Some of you guys (and gals?) must have pretty miserable lives if trolling on the internet is the highlight of your day.
Actually, I felt completely confident walking out of L1. And got ultra stellar scores.
Congrats, you’ve won at life. I appreciate the encouraging words from the few rational people on here.
AndyPettite your logic is very flawed mathematically speaking. One can walk out of a difficult exam feeling confident and one can walk out of an easy exam feeling unsure. Lack of confidence does not imply difficult exam and vice versa. Apply the same axiom to the easiness of the exam. See? I agree with Johny who said that some of you have poor reading skills. How did you pass L1 and l2 and 3 given that the exam is so conceptual?? And again what he was saying is that Schweser was different from the actual exam which is true. He’s also saying that Schweser didn’t help him. But there are many people who feel the same. I’m not one of them for example but I see Johnny’s point. How shocking! I have a different opinion! Oh the sacrilege! Iteracom, if feeling confident and getting stellar scores out of the exam is the highlight of your life I feel very sorry for you. You should get a new one. Or get laid. Or both. I met a CFA chartholder today (very senior in his position) who was laid off when Bear Sterns collapsed…so get off your high horse a little. Unless you were sarcastic. Johnny, summer is here. I live in NY and this city is at its best during summer. Given that it’s the best all around the year, then imagine what it is like now. What I’m trying to say to you and to myself is that there’s nothing we can do now and thank god it’s over. I’m confident you did well given your mock scores.
I dont know what all this fuss is about. everyone is different… funnily though I found some topics in L2 covered more comprehensively in schweser as compared to CFAI books…
IMHO, Kaplan is Awesome. Scheweser can’t teach you 100%… I took the L1 exam last week and did find 4-5 questions that schweser completely overlooked. Put simply… If The CFAI texts can take you from 0 to 100% of the CBOK in time T The schweser texts can get you from 0 to 95% in T/2
zinamarina Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > AndyPettite your logic is very flawed > mathematically speaking. One can walk out of a > difficult exam feeling confident and one can walk > out of an easy exam feeling unsure. Lack of > confidence does not imply difficult exam and vice > versa. Apply the same axiom to the easiness of the > exam. See? > I agree with Johny who said that some of you have > poor reading skills. How did you pass L1 and l2 > and 3 given that the exam is so conceptual?? And > again what he was saying is that Schweser was > different from the actual exam which is true. He’s > also saying that Schweser didn’t help him. But > there are many people who feel the same. I’m not > one of them for example but I see Johnny’s point. > How shocking! I have a different opinion! Oh the > sacrilege! > Iteracom, if feeling confident and getting stellar > scores out of the exam is the highlight of your > life I feel very sorry for you. You should get a > new one. Or get laid. Or both. I met a CFA > chartholder today (very senior in his position) > who was laid off when Bear Sterns collapsed…so > get off your high horse a little. Unless you were > sarcastic. > Johnny, summer is here. I live in NY and this city > is at its best during summer. Given that it’s the > best all around the year, then imagine what it is > like now. What I’m trying to say to you and to > myself is that there’s nothing we can do now and > thank god it’s over. I’m confident you did well > given your mock scores. Dude your logic is flawed. You assumed that I believed those two are mutually exclusive. Nowhere did I say that. I guess you have poor reading comprehension. I said his blame was unwarranted, if he thought the exam was easy, and he was still not confident, why the hell is he blaming schweser?
Hey, Just cool man, I am sure spartanag07 didn’t mean anything bad. He was just trying to make his point. And we all must accept that the motive behind these exams is not that we study short notes or give mock exams and prepare for the exam. Motive is to develop the understanding of basics of Finance in a way that we can apply them whenever they needed to be. Good luck to all of you with ur results.
OK, I never come on the LI forum, but decided to drop in here. I’m going to make some points. To start off, I network pretty hard among the CFA communities, I’ve also helped a fair amount of people prepare for exams and seen probably 100’s of candidates pass through these forum. I went three for three, in other words, I have some basis my remarks. You can take them or leave them. First off, the OP did start the thread by explicitly blaming Schweser, one of, if not THE most popular third party provider. I’ve always used CFAi materials, that was my strategy choice, but the overwhelming majority of my friends used Schweser for all three levels with great success. The OP should in light of this information really consider if Schweser was really to blame, or whether his/her perceived lack of preparedness was his/her own doing. The OP’s argument was based on the fact that the topics emphasized by Schweser did not appear on the test. That being said, as I mentioned, I used CFAi for all three levels and this happened on all three levels to me using CFAI texts. So, this is not something that is unique to Schweser. The remedy for this is to study so thoroughly that you are ready to destroy on any minute topic. That is what I, and most passers do. You simply cannot game this exam by studying what you think are the key topics. You must study all topics, this is why CFA structures their tests so trivially, to prevent candidates from skipping or “gaming” the material. LASTLY: Looking at the names of the posters on the “you’re own dumb fault” vs “you’re being too harsh, douche” debate… One thing stands out to me, all of those in the “it’s your own dumb fault” camp (builders, iteracom, greengrape,etc) are in series finance positions (ER, buy side, etc), have passed many if not all of the exams, have been around this community for awhile, or are some combination of those three. The ones who believe people are being too harsh and “never want to become that vindictive and douchy” are generally less seasoned in the industry or have not yet been confirmed to have passed any levels. This is just a simple observation, take from it what you may. Maybe passing / working in such a competitive industry makes you cynical, maybe being cynical allows you to succeed in such a competitive industry. I won’t argue causality here. And lastly, my own view is that placing blame on outside parties never allowed anyone to succeed. Put me in whichever side of this debate you feel necessary.
And I’d like to make one further point. The OP seems to want to be “special”. You’ve got an industry professional exam which has a pass rate of 40%. He prepared the average recommended amount 225 (roughly 200). Therefore his expectation should be a 60% chance of failure. Maybe we’ll throw him a bone for his extra 25 hours of herculean effort and call it 50% chance of failure. This is in line with how he says he feels. Why’s the poster complaining and blaming the study materials? If the OP wants to feel special (90% confidence) than he has to prepare himself better than the overwhelming majority of his peers on an exam with a 40% pass rate. This means either more effective studying or more studying. He has demonstrated neither. So why the disgruntled post? One of the first things you will learn in this industry is that you are no longer special. It is loaded with smart people who are extremely competitive. The best any of us can hope for is to average in the face intense competition and to respond with our best efforts. If this does not appeal to you, best to work in a less competitive, less intellectual field.
All fair points being made here.
i wish this thread would die sooner rather than later
Funny, this thread feels the same about you… Not me, this thread.
It’s clear there are a bunch of young people in this thread. hopefully you guys will take it as a wake-up call. This isn’t school anymore where you’re spoon fed whats on the midterm and given a formula sheet to use. Seasoned industry professionals take this exam, and if were as easy and straightforward as you want it to be, everyone would have the CFA charter, and it becomes meaningless. Like Black Swan said, the only way to make people study the entire curriculum is to test random details here and there. You can debate how useless and horrible this method is, but if you want to pass, it forces you to study everything. There are no tricks here. Everything on the exam is in the CFA curriculum sent to you when you registered.
iteracom Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > It’s clear there are a bunch of young people in > this thread. hopefully you guys will take it as a > wake-up call. This isn’t school anymore where > you’re spoon fed whats on the midterm and given a > formula sheet to use. Seasoned industry > professionals take this exam, and if were as easy > and straightforward as you want it to be, everyone > would have the CFA charter, and it becomes > meaningless. > > Like Black Swan said, the only way to make people > study the entire curriculum is to test random > details here and there. You can debate how useless > and horrible this method is, but if you want to > pass, it forces you to study everything. > > There are no tricks here. Everything on the exam > is in the CFA curriculum sent to you when you > registered. +1
iteracom Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > It’s clear there are a bunch of young people in > this thread. hopefully you guys will take it as a > wake-up call. This isn’t school anymore where > you’re spoon fed whats on the midterm and given a > formula sheet to use. Seasoned industry > professionals take this exam, and if were as easy > and straightforward as you want it to be, everyone > would have the CFA charter, and it becomes > meaningless. > > Like Black Swan said, the only way to make people > study the entire curriculum is to test random > details here and there. You can debate how useless > and horrible this method is, but if you want to > pass, it forces you to study everything. > > There are no tricks here. Everything on the exam > is in the CFA curriculum sent to you when you > registered. Couldn’t agree more! It’s hard to suck it up but that’s what it is.
Hey Johnny… I’d stop blaming a study guide. It’s not the arrow, it’s the indian.
+1 The message has been put across. Not let’s end it here? Penny-wenny Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > i wish this thread would die sooner rather than > later
Tough love is a good thing when used effectively. Thank you to those that added meaningful insight, even if it wasn’t what I wanted to here. If I failed, I learned a lesson. If I passed, I still learned a lesson. I made my first post in the heat of the moment shortly after the exam. I could have worded it differently and avoided the brunt of the douchness but alas, this is my final post in this thread.