I have spent the last 2 weeks on nothing but chapter four of becker.  I have completed ALL of gleim's questions in those areas as well and have taken extensive notes. I have also really examined when i have missed a question and i have found that between gleim and becker i am missing roughly the same type of questions.  I really have worked at understanding these questions and why i missed them.  NOT just why the right answer is right but why the wrong answers are wrong.  I do think its important to breakdown the mcq's, sims, and written communications area to help understand why you got the numerical score.  I think mine was close to passing because i did "stronger" than a passing student in the mcq's. 

I have also "mastered" in my mind chapter three that has to primarily due with internal control.  I am really strong in ch 1, 2, and 5 but will redue every mcq and sim by the time that the test comes. 

This is one thing I have learned about diagnostic reports during my experience with the CPA exam (especially with AUD, by far the trickiest section of them all).

1. The diagnostic report can be a useful tool for one's strategy going forward.

2. But it can also be a big distraction.

My advice is try to avoid reading too much into your comparisons between your content area score vs those of passing candidates, especially if you think you were very close and should have passed.

I know this is easier said than done, but if there are people who have some credibility on this, then I consider myself to be one of them. When I first read my diagnostic report, I really thought "I should have been given" a passing score because my content area scores were, in general, comparable to those of passing candidates.

But I later realized that rather than dwelling on something I had no control over, I had to put myself in the shoes of the AICPA graders and objectively find the real reasons for receiving a failing grade. I knew that going back into reviewing AUD with an "I did everything I could to pass and still failed" mindset would not only provide me with no motivation to tackle the exam again, but would also not help me with formulating any strategy for success. I didn't want to put a ceiling for myself.

Once my rational side of the brain took over from my emotional side, something clicked in my mind - I didn't feel very good about my SIMs coming out of the exam, and the actual SIMs results were probably worse than my assessment of my performance coming out of the exam room. While I got what seem to be passing content area scores based on the diagnostic report, the AICPA graders probably thought my weak performance in AUD pecluded a passing score.

I strongly believe that this realization that I was so close to passing even though I bombed my SIMs big time became an encouraging sign and helped my formulate my plan for Part II showdown with AUD. In addition to making sure I practiced enough SIMs, I knew that the secret to doing well in both SIMs and MCQs is to understand the concepts.

So, I did another review for AUD as if I had never done any before (it too far less time and it was far more interesting), and not necessarily focus on my "weak" areas. I knew that AUD content areas are so interdependent that a better understanding of concepts that the diag report suggested "I knew" would only help me understand my so called weak areas even better.

The rest is history.

Just a doubt , let us say u did good in MCQ and SIM  but could not write good in the Written communication section will the graders fail you .  I mean by any chance does Written communication decide the pass/fail of a candidate .

I am from India and for some reason feel that I might have failed because of a weaker written communication.

If a person did good in written communication and did not do good in MCQ , does he/she have an advantage