Level 3 - input from those who have taken the exam before?

CFA Level III
#1

For those that passed, what mock scores were you hitting in the AM and PM 1 month out (around now) and just prior to exam day?

Also those that didn’t pass, similar question. What did you lack studywise when you didn’t pass 1st time?

#2

Don’t remember the AMs since you are grading subjectively but IIRC mid 60s based on my own grading. Afternoons were low to mid 70s.

#3

Thanks. And how did you feel going into the exam with those scores. And how did you find the actual exam on the day.

#4

#BaymaxNeedsToKnow

#5

My AM papers got better as I went along (I did a lot of them). Early on I was in the high 50’s/low 60’s and by the end I was in the high 60’s and may have even gotten in the 70’s for a few. I kept a detailed excel file that tracked all this but have since trashed it. As stated though, since I was grading the AM papers it’s always hard to get the full picture, even if you’re being as objective as you possibly can. PM was mid 70’s.

If you’ve done a lot of the prior CFAI papers in a timed setting, you shouldn’t find exam day all that different. The only thing I noticed different was the added adrenaline which helped. The morning was easily the quickest three hours of my life, and I needed every second to get through the questions. Afternoon was much easier, at least in terms of time.

#6

I took Level III twice - first time I wasn’t ready - had a some personal life stuff happening around my exam. I felt really good going into it last year. It was the only exam I had to take twice.

#7

I failed band 9 last year but it was very close… in my case it was just poor execution I can look at the AM exam and see the dumb/careless mistakes… because I knew all the mateiral… time management was my downfall because even though I did all the exams multiple times… I never once did a “timed” run in exam conditions… last year a few questions threw me off.

The Excel file trick mentioned above is a bid deal… this year I have one with every BB/EOC / online topic test and past exam by question and my process now is just filtering down the questions that I can check off as easy and focusing on then “hard” ones.

Finally… if you are getting above 60% on a mock at this point you have a chance of passing but you have to go hard the final month… I’m targeting another 200 hours in last 4 weeks…

#8

What caused you to feel really good. What scores were you getting in mocks?