Quick Tips from Recent Charterholder for Exam Day as a Thanks to AF

Sharing a few words of advice / encouragement because this site was so helpful to me from 2016-2018. It’s super weird for me as it is for many charterholders not to have studied for an exam this year.

  1. For each question, figure out what the question is actually asking, and answer it. It’s easy to be in a rush – just remember you get no points by answering the wrong question, or answering something you thought they asked.

  2. Test day is from 9am-5pm. If you have a rough go of it like I did in the AM, have some lunch, maybe meditate or get your focus back, and get yourself ready to crush the PM. You’ve studied up to a year for this exam, and you cannot affect your score after this weekend, so leave it all on the field.

  3. Get points where you can find them. It’s impossible to know everything perfectly, and no one gets a prize for getting a 100% on the exam, if that were even possible. If you don’t know the answer to something, move on. Had I not done that I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t have passed the exam last year. Bringing it back to #2, if you felt like you lost a bunch of points in the AM, get 'em back in the PM. Until 5pm hits, they’re all up for grabs.

  4. Just enjoy it! This is for many of you the last time that you’re going to have the privilege of ripping open a fresh exam booklet and sharing the knowledge you’ve learned over the past year about how to provide real thought leadership, investment analysis, and recommendations in a variety of finance contexts. The real world, the markets, etc, are much more complicated. Enjoy the camaraderie of the day and be proud that you’re with 20k+ of some of the smartest financial professionals in the world strutting your stuff. L1 and definitely L2 are no cakewalks, and you got through those and had the courage and the energy to come back for more.

Take it from someone who finished: Passing the three exams, especially for those who have the designation, will never not be a source of pride and hopefully a positive memory of the determination and pluck you’ve demonstrated these last 3, 4, or however many years in the CFA program. It’ll always be something you can remember and lean on in tough times, telling yourself – that was very intense, but I didn’t give up, and I got through it.

Leave it all on the field on Saturday! I’m sure you’ll do great. Thanks again to AF for being a great resource.

MG

Thanks for this, good tips. I definitely want to try and enjoy at least some of it. While the process has been horrible, I’ve also kind of liked learning all this stuff.

Thank you! :wink:

unfortunately fitchlearning portal down today, plan to continue use their Qbank to hammer the concept very quick because very easy format. i saw you also use fitchlearning mate on your badge.

I do but not for the last few weeks. Honestly I’ve found their questions to be terrible. Their mocks aren’t bad though although not many of them.

Today all I’ve done is a quick review of last year’s AM paper just for confidence. Will go through the formula sheet tonight and then tomorrow completely off.

Thank you for your words.

well I’m exhausted… And I dont feel comfortable yet considering the essay test, but I tried to do my best. I’ll slow down tonight, but revising some subject and specials points.

With one kid (4 years) and one baby (10 months) working in average 55 hours per week, I’m happy to have got up to here. Let’s rock in this final test and I wish God save us.

I only have the 10 month old and the job…yet I know the pain! Well done for doing it with the two kids!