Yes I am a retaker from last year. I admit I didn’t study nearly as much as I did for level 2. I was just to burned out from 1 & 2 back to back and couldn’t do it. I feel better this year and ready to go at it again since last year was kind of a semi break with my lack of effort.
Anyways as I recall last year the Schweser notes were good but for Level 3 CFAI materials were comparable to Schweser. What I mean is CFAI L3 seems to be very lean without all the extra stuff that are packed in Level 1 and 2 materials. Schweser notes were nice cause it was straight ot the point and I got what I needed. So this year i’m thinking of just reading CFAI books since there really aren’t that many pages and it’s mostly reading/writing so I won’t have to worry about spending 1 day on 1 problem.
Just wondering if other people who may have used Schweser for level 3 felt or feels the same way?
Maybe it’s because I’m at work late but I’m not really understanding what you’re inquiring.
Are you asking if you should just use CFAI texts along with Schweser? Or just Schweser? Or just CFAI texts?
I’m a first-timer so I’d really like to get people’s opinion on just using Schweser for material notes and then doing EOC & “Blue Box” questions in the CFAI texts plus as many CFAI AM & PM (especially AM) mock exams I can get my hands on.
This is my plan as of now. I am 2 for 2 using Schweser only but I know Level 3 is a completely different animal…
I think the CFAI material helped me the most for Level III. I was also tired of furtively carrying around the Schweser books in public because they look like soft light pornographic material with the smiling ladies on the cover.
It is!! For L3 I followed the pattern of the previous Levels, but when it came to EOC / mocks etc.I had to consult CFAI materials to get deeper knowledge!
I used the schweser’s videos to cover up some gaps and accelerate learning late in the game, but CFAI are thorough at the level you need to be on this exam.
I passed L3 by using only Schweser’s stuff. (I also used CFAI’s EoC questions.) So it’s certainly doable.
My .02 - Study all the material, but maintain focus on the AM portion of the exam. If you can nail an essay question on subject X, then you can certainly pick the right answer out of three.
Schweser is not deep enough or broad enough - you might pass but you’d be more confident if you studied the L3 curriculum. At least EOC, blue boxes and text that applies to those questions.
A lot of people will disagree with me here, but the intentional vaguness of the Schweser mock exams is a huge motivation to keep studying when you start realizing how much you need to brush up on your weak areas.
I was scoring high 60’s when I started writing them, and peaked at higher 70’s scores by exam #6. After revisiting the weak areas that came up in those exams, I went on to get scores in the 85-90% on the past three CFAI exams and felt like I cruised through the actual exam.