I’m posting this becuase I wish i would have come across a post like this before I started studying for Level 1.
First off I used Schweser Notes, Practice Tests, and the online Q-Bank and it was very helpful. I never cracked the CFAI books. I was well prepared and Schweser did a great job of covering all the material.
I read through all the notes and did every practice question for each section. I then realized I needed to go back through and read much of the notes again…this upset me. Anyways, I probably read through 80-90% of the material for a second time and did the majority of the practice questions again (when I read stuff about people doing this I didn’t believe it and I thought there was no way I would do that, so if you think the same thing after reading the previous sentence you would not be alone).
I did all 6 practice tests from Schweser.
I did the CFA mock exam twice and a few other questions a third time.
What I found very very very helpful was using the Schweser Q-Bank and setting the filter to only give me the hardest questions available. If I could go back I would do these advanced questions for each topic right after I finished going through the material, i.e. after done reading through ethics I would have done all the ethics questions. It is a little tricky to find out how to setup the Q-Bank to only give you these, but it’s definitely possible. I did a ton of these the week before the test, but wish I would have started doing them about a month before.
I took the week off work before the test – this is most likely what got me over the hump. If you do not have the entire week off to study before the test you can pass, but you really stack the odds against you. These were 12 hour days of studying 7 days in a row (the wierdest feeling - the human body is not meant to do something like this. I did exercise each day, which most likely kept me from going insane.
Schweser lists needed formulas for each topic in the back of each topic book. It took me a while but i had them all memorized <—- a must.
I might be forgetting a little bit, but I hope this helps someone. Feel free to ask questions. Good luck.
First off I used Schweser Notes, Practice Tests, and the online Q-Bank and it was very helpful. I never cracked the CFAI books. I was well prepared and Schweser did a great job of covering all the material.
I read through all the notes and did every practice question for each section. I then realized I needed to go back through and read much of the notes again…this upset me. Anyways, I probably read through 80-90% of the material for a second time and did the majority of the practice questions again (when I read stuff about people doing this I didn’t believe it and I thought there was no way I would do that, so if you think the same thing after reading the previous sentence you would not be alone).
I did all 6 practice tests from Schweser.
I did the CFA mock exam twice and a few other questions a third time.
What I found very very very helpful was using the Schweser Q-Bank and setting the filter to only give me the hardest questions available. If I could go back I would do these advanced questions for each topic right after I finished going through the material, i.e. after done reading through ethics I would have done all the ethics questions. It is a little tricky to find out how to setup the Q-Bank to only give you these, but it’s definitely possible. I did a ton of these the week before the test, but wish I would have started doing them about a month before.
I took the week off work before the test – this is most likely what got me over the hump. If you do not have the entire week off to study before the test you can pass, but you really stack the odds against you. These were 12 hour days of studying 7 days in a row (the wierdest feeling - the human body is not meant to do something like this. I did exercise each day, which most likely kept me from going insane.
Schweser lists needed formulas for each topic in the back of each topic book. It took me a while but i had them all memorized <—- a must.
I might be forgetting a little bit, but I hope this helps someone. Feel free to ask questions. Good luck.