L2 Takers: Did you fail 2015 and Pass 2016?

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hbeytollah

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Just got a band 8. Absolutely gutted. For those who failed in 2015 and passed in 2016, what advice would you give someone like me? What changes did you make studying the second time around?
Thanks,
HB
 
Band 10 last year. Over 70 in all topics this year.
Major difference was I mainly used the CFAI material. Also what I did differently was I wrote down all the equations they used in the blue boxes and EOCc, mocks and topic tests. Then I would put a reference page number in case I need to see an example of the numbers crunched. I then put them all into flashcard form and kept reviewing it. Last week I just reread ethics.
Good luck man keep on battling.
 
I feel for you. I failed with band 8 last year. I managed to sneak the pass this year. I think with band 8, you clearly know a large chunk of the information but there may be a few concepts that aren’t sticking. More time and continued efforts will see you through. Just make sure you don’t gloss over things the second time round. You have to be disciplined and think, I clearly don’t know this, otherwise I would have passed. Good luck and stay positive!! You’ll have much more time with a great base to start from. Get as many practice exams as you can, even if you think you’re not ready for them.
 
I failed band 8 last year and passed this year. Last year I had only done two mock exams, this year I did 11 different ones, with some more than once. Last year I started studying in February, this year I started in October. I agree with the flash cards, I hand wrote every formula on an index card and tried my best to memorize them. I took photos of each and every card on my phone and looked at them when I was in line for coffee, traveling, etc. Last year I brushed off derivatives and this year I made sure to master it, especially the swap stuff.
 
Band 9 last year, passed this year.
Advice is tough as everyone works differently, but here’s a few things I changed this year.
1) I read the entire CFA curriculum this year, where I went straight from Wiley notes/videos last year. This is probably not necessary, and going straight from a study provider is fine for most people, but I had the time this year and it may have helped with some of the qualitative stuff.
2) More study hours. In 2015 I logged 350 hours, for 2016 I logged 655.
3) More mocks. In 2015 I managed 2.5 mocks, for 2016 I did 7 full mocks.
4) More time with formulas. I spent more time memorizing formulas and calculation steps/methods. This exam has a lot of qualitative material, but there are some easy points from knowing formulas as well.
Sorry for missing this year and all the best on your next attempt. Hard work pays off on this exam, period.
 
I failed band 5 last year, passed this year. Last year when I failed I started January 1st, and used K/S study materials. I scored well on all the practices from K/S, but failed the actual exam. This time around I started December 1, and worked strictly from the CFAI circ.
CFAI circ was a lot more to cover, but at least that way you see everything that could be on the exam. I did all the EOCs, the online topic tests, and the CFA mocks from this year and last. The other thing I did that I found helpful was to redo mock exams and topic tests. Don’t just memorize the answer, but how to solve the problem. Do it over and over until you know it cold. Then do a new mock, and repeat.
The is no magic bullet, but being band 8 means your on the cusp. A few more correct answers, and strong ethics showing and you’re on to level 3.
Last thing I’ll say, register for level 2 tomorrow. It took the focus off the fail, and made me think about next time.
Best of luck through the rest of the program… level 2 is a tough one..
 
I passed this time after band 8 last year. Two main changes:
-I used qbank sparingly (if i had a few free minutes) and instead relied on the CFAI EOC’s for basically all practice outside of mock exams. This made a huge difference and I could tell there were many gaps that I closed compared to only using kaplan the year prior.
-I did the online weekly lecture through Kaplan- this kept me on track and also simplified a lot of the topics. Andrew Holmes was awesome. For context, I struggled badly last year with quant. This year I understood it completely by the end of the 3 hour lecture… was just a matter of memorizing from there. At the end of the day it’s all about practicing, but having someone say it out loud and simplify a lot of the heavy topics made such a huge difference for me. If you are someone who struggles to sit down and plow through page after page after a long day at work, I can’t recommend taking a class like this enough.
 
I failed last year and was in band 5. I passed this time around. Here are the changes I made:
- Studied only from CFAI curriculum, didn’t use Schweser or any other provider. Last year I studied out of the Schweser books and I don’t think they were that useful to me. This year I did each and every practice problem from the end of the chapters and went over every example in the CFAI texts.
- I did the CFAI mock, 6 of the Schweser mocks and all the topic tests available on the CFAI website. My scores were in the mid to late 60s for nearly all the mocks I did, I might have gotten a 70 here and there. I reviewed each mock at least 2-3 times because I wanted to make sure I understood my mistakes. The Topic tests were awfully hard, but I made notes and went back and studied them and learned from my mistakes. Can’t stress how important this step was! For a lot of us, doing the topic tests is the last step in our prep, and the website was down a lot. I printed all the topic tests out so that I could do them without worrying about the website being down.
- I wrote my own notes for each chapter and when I was crunch time I studied from my own notes.
Lastly, for those of you debating whether to retake next year or not, please don’t lose hope! You got this…just analyze your studying habits and change what isn’t working for you anymore. That’s what I did and it paid off.
 
I am pretty disappointed that I failed with a band 10. I prepared thoroughly for the equity section and yet got below 50%. I am puzzled with my scores as I seem to do well in all my mocks for equity. I made some pretty bad life decision and this failure really hit me hard. I am clueless with what to do with my life now.
 
band 7 last year pass this year. This year studied exclusively from CFAI. It was much more long winded but it really helped my understanding of the content. I got >70 in 6 subjects and 2 below 50. good luck
 
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