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DanielleIvy
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Joined: 13 May 2009
Location: United States
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Posts: 253

Posted: 12 Jul 2009 at 21:20 \| IP Logged

Please bear with me, as I know I have asked this on the FAR board as well, but am hoping to maybe reach a different audience.

I took FAR and feel I did well on the multiple choice. The simulations were somewhat obscure and feel I will be lucky to muster half of the credit for them.

Does anyone have any experience with passing the exam with poor sim performance? Any advice would be appreciated. Thanks in advance!

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FAR - 96
AUD - 99
REG - 95
BEC - 91

futurebeancount
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Joined: 15 Jul 2009
Location: United States
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Posts: 40

Posted: 15 Jul 2009 at 22:00 \| IP Logged

I know exactly how you feel! I took my FAR exam only 3 days ago...what's
embarrassing is how much time I spent preparing. I added it up, over
200 hours.

I really felt good about the multiple choice, felt there were only 2-3
questions that I was unfamiliar, the rest I felt very confident that I had at
least seen and studied the materials.

I was completely caught off guard on the simulation. The simulations
had so much more content and tabs than the practice simulations (I had
done 2 times each with Becker). I simply ran out of time, and left several
tabs blank between both simulations. I did, however, do quite well on the
written communications. I made sure to complete both communications
thoroughly, as I know the bulk of the sim grade is for the comm.

I pretty much was traumatized the whole way home, and still am, but I
have found a few blog postings of others who seemed to have
miraculously passed even though they did poorly on the simulations
(although I havne't seen any posting for those who had done poorly on
FAR, most of the bloggers in our situation had taken REG and "bombed"
the sims but still passed). We will see. Hopefully I did as well on the
MCQ as I think I did.

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Nan - Louisiana
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Joined: 15 May 2009
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Posts: 699

Posted: 15 Jul 2009 at 23:52 \| IP Logged

I took FAR last November. It was my first exam. I didn't know about the adaptive MCQ testlets. Becker seems to have forgotten to mention that..... I allowed an equal amount of time for all three. First testlet was easy enough, and I had plenty of my planned time left to verify my answers. On the 2nd and 3rd testlets I got upset with myself because I thought I was overtired from studying and therefore needing too much time for the same number of problems.

Got to the sims with about an hour and 10 minutes, I think. The book says 35 to 40 minutes per sim, so I'm still OK.... Still snarling about my "slowing" performance on the MCQs, I attacked the first sim with vigor. I did the writing part, the other tabs, and spent 5 minutes trying to find the research question I found something that looked good and marked it, but still wasn't convinced. Discovered the hard way that the much-touted "formulas" feature in the exam spreadsheet is more primitive than the 1988 version of Lotus 123. Make one keystroke mistake and lose everything you've just spent 2 minutes constructing. Repeat. Repeat. Snarl. Start over again using the stubby pencil method. I finished the first sim with less than 18 minutes remaining.

2nd sim: straight to the writing tab. No time to think, so I just tried to write something intelligent. Spent 2-3 minutes looking for the research question, but kept missing with the search engine. Finally gave up. On to the other tabs in the remaining minutes. Made as many first-impression guesses as I could, gave a stab at the math equations, then decided to spend the last few minutes editing the communication tab. Add a line, rearrange for coherency of thought, insert a new paragraph in the middle.... and the clock hit zero and locked me out mid-sentence.

I figured I had a 50/50 shot at having made a passing grade on FAR. I scored an 85.

__________________
FAR - 85 - Nov 08
AUD - 98 - Feb 09
BEC - 88 - Apr 09
REG - 90 - May 09
Do it once, do it right, get it over with

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Latanya
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Joined: 15 Jul 2009
Location: United States
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Posts: 5

Posted: 16 Jul 2009 at 00:21 \| IP Logged

I'm newbie, I just started studying I purchase all my study material for FAR exam first, from Gleim can any suggest how I should tackle my studies. Any suggestions will be helpful. Thanks

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futurebeancount
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Joined: 15 Jul 2009
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Posted: 16 Jul 2009 at 07:46 \| IP Logged

Thank you Nan! I am so glad I found this forum... I also studied with becker, and allotted 50 - 55 minutes for each MC testlet. I was also impressed that I had time to go back and review my answer, but you are right, I found myself struggling with time at the end of the third testlet. I ended the MC with 1 hr 15 minutes left.

It is good to know that you passed, and with an impressive score as well. Congratulations on passing all four parts, wish the rest of us luck.

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