Scoring Low on Past Exams

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I’ve taken 3 CFA past am exams + 1 schweser, and keep scoring between 55-60%! pretty disappointing and feeling demotivated.
Would you guys recommend going over the BB and TT again, or keep on doing mocks and studying the guideline answers?
 
there’s still time, do whatever you think is the best. 55-60% might just be the MPS for this year.
 
analyst forum scores are biased upwards for two reasons:
1. people lie. its nature. and
2. the best and most prepared are the ones who chill on AF message boards. the future Band 2-6 guys and gals are on the beach now. not posting on AF
that all said, i think its alarming that most people are ripping the MC. i got a 246/360 on the topic tests on CFAI, and i thought that was a good score, but apparently everyone is ripping casual 45/60s on MCs. thats disheartening.
i hope yall are lying. because i cant come to grips with a 40/60 being considered a “bad score”
 
I don’t think 40/60 is a bad score on MCs. I think folks are just aiming higher on MC because of the uncertainty that the essay section represents. Also, it’s partially a mental thing; every one on AF is serious about passing and as soon as you label your scores as “good” you stop doing the work to improve.
 
So edbert just to clarify. When people on AF refer to the “old CFAI mocks” they’re referring to your link?
Second question: is this where I should skip all FI because it’s not relevant anymore ?
 
these go by many names, like cfai mocks, past papers, old mocks yada yada. there are however people out there who have access to past papers dating back to 2007
consult with this link to find which parts of past papers are still relevant (and yes, FI and AA are primarily irrelevant, so if you need practice for those, there’s not much choice)
https://ift.world/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/Level-III-Essay-Questions-R...
 
What I’ve noticed is that it’s generally teh people who have done well in the practice/mock tests who are posting their scores on AF. The ones that did bad generally don’t do so, so don’t be too disheartened.
 
Thiru Cumaran wrote:
What I’ve noticed is that it’s generally teh people who have done well in the practice/mock tests who are posting their scores on AF. The ones that did bad generally don’t do so, so don’t be too disheartened.
Click to expand...
Self-selection bias right there! Just like in hedge fund benchmarks.
 
just took schweser volume 2 exam 2.
42/60 on the MC and friggin 93/180 on the essay. its like im honestly 2 different people on the two sections. i have no idea what i can do here. i truly feel i know the material well enough to pass, i really do. but this gulf between my scores is getting out of hand.
i started thinking about partial credit: how much do you give yourself on a big juicy 12 point question where they ask for 3 things and then an overall conclusion: let’s say you get the answer wrong, but your supporting evidence for your wrong answer is right (as in, you give the opposite overall directional advice that the question asks for, but your underlying reasons would be correct if that was indeed the right answer). am i really to give myself a big fat 0/10 on questions like those?
(i have been giving myself those 0s, for the record. and thats why im wondering about my low 50s on essays. are they really high 50s that im scoring incorrectly?)
 
I’m sure that the Schweser Answer Key should reflect the fact that you’ll score some marks for the underlying reasons, even if you’re overall conclusion is wrong.
If I were you, I’d be more worried about your PM session score. I’ve been through the grind 2 times previously, and if there’s one thing that I’ve noticed from the scores of people who pass L3, they generally score around 50-60% for the AM session, but totally ace the PM session, with >70% for 9 item-sets.
 
Tommyjohn wrote:
i started thinking about partial credit: how much do you give yourself on a big juicy 12 point question where they ask for 3 things and then an overall conclusion: let’s say you get the answer wrong, but your supporting evidence for your wrong answer is right (as in, you give the opposite overall directional advice that the question asks for, but your underlying reasons would be correct if that was indeed the right answer). am i really to give myself a big fat 0/10 on questions like those?
Click to expand...
if that’s the case, 0/10 is indeed correct. if there’s 12 points and 3 reasons needed, you’d probably get 3 points for the correct choice, and 3 points for each correct reason/justification.
 
Looks like the low-scorer passed the exam, days after saying he was scoring low
 
She*, as the rest of the people mentioned, the scores posted in this forum are biased or maybe some people are easy when marking their practice test, I used to give myself zero if I am not getting everything right. Good luck on the exam and keep doing previous exams!
 
She*, as the rest of the people mentioned, the scores posted in this forum are biased or maybe some people are easy when marking their practice test, I used to give myself zero if I am not getting everything right. Good luck on the exam and keep doing previous exams!
 
There’s no sense in doing more than 6-7 mocks, in my opinion. The reality is that the material can be asked a million different ways and rather than taking every CFAI or Kaplan, Wiley, or any other test prep provider’s mock, you should really do whatever makes you feel comfortable (6-7, maybe less) and then review those answers and make sure you know why you got them wrong. It’s better to learn from your low scores on the mocks you did rather than do another mock because the changes that new mock can ask you 15 other topics that weren’t on your past mocks….is high.
That being said, those scores aren’t that low. Know why you got things wrong and you’ll be good to go for game day.
 
DoYouLikePhilCollins wrote:
There’s no sense in doing more than 6-7 mocks, in my opinion. The reality is that the material can be asked a million different ways and rather than taking every CFAI or Kaplan, Wiley, or any other test prep provider’s mock, you should really do whatever makes you feel comfortable (6-7, maybe less) and then review those answers and make sure you know why you got them wrong. It’s better to learn from your low scores on the mocks you did rather than do another mock because the changes that new mock can ask you 15 other topics that weren’t on your past mocks….is high.
That being said, those scores aren’t that low. Know why you got things wrong and you’ll be good to go for game day.
Click to expand...
Agreed… I think at this point it’s just a matter of staying focused during the exam. There would be no benefit harassing your brain to do more mocks. I am just summarising my notes again and that is it!
 
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