标题: Less than 50% in all topics in AM [打印本页] 作者: waldziuchna 时间: 2011-8-24 22:12 标题: Less than 50% in all topics in AM
I am just shocked how I got less than 50% in all topics in AM. How could this happen. What should I do next time? Is it that I completely missed something this time?作者: Analti_Calte 时间: 2011-8-24 22:18
Did you write your answers on the lined paper and/or the templates? Dumb question but that would be one route to that score. Or perhaps mis-numbering/not numbering answers?作者: RMontgomery 时间: 2011-8-24 22:23
Are you not supposed to write answers on the lined paper or in the template provided? Where ever there was a template provided they mentioned we had to write it in the template? Even I have got < 50% on most sets in the AM session作者: pimpineasy 时间: 2011-8-24 22:30
But I guess there weren't templates provided for all questions, only some questions and wherever they asked for it, I wrote the answer in the template, otherwise on the lined paper.
And I've got less than 50 in all AM sections - how can this be possible?作者: bigredhockey55 时间: 2011-8-24 22:36
Study more作者: economicz 时间: 2011-8-24 22:42
majority below 50 in AM. first test I have ever failed作者: former 时间: 2011-8-24 22:48
first two questions in the AM paper went well for me ... or so i thought! but results showed i had below 50 in both the first questions. It is very possible ... id say look at the markschemes and expect those answers to not be sufficient! i suspect very very little partial credit gets awarded!
Good luck next year!作者: therecruit 时间: 2011-8-24 22:54
janakisri...you were a great help on the forum this year...we'll kill it together next year.作者: mkytz15 时间: 2011-8-24 23:00
I had a very similar feeling. I thought I did answer the AM session questions well, but was surprised by the way the scores went - 6 < 50%, 3 > 70%.
I found that the questions I answered first were the ones I got > 70%. All the rest was < 50%.
So need to
a. tighten up on the AM sections definitely.
b. look at the guideline answers when they come out in Spring 2012 - after answering the 2011 paper then once more - and see what was lacking, in light of the new preparation - and see what is really going wrong.
What it does mean is - I need to be prepared way earlier - allowing for all distractions / trials / tribulations that I might go thro' to be able to answer the paper as soon as it becomes available.
CP作者: Kapie 时间: 2011-8-24 23:06
I felt same day, i thought i did ok for AM session, but the scores went -5< 50%.
any retaker who crashed essay quetions this year can share some tips?作者: dirk01 时间: 2011-8-24 23:12
I thought I did great in the AM session. Among all three levels, I never felt so good ater giving the exams. But the results was very disappointing.作者: sameeragarwal 时间: 2011-8-24 23:17
Looking at the consistenly poor AM results posted on this site, CFAI needs to explain why either:
a) it is doing a bad job educating candidates on the CBOK but is still passing people that don't really know what they are doing, or
b) there is something badly wrong with the test format.
The mere fact that AM results are consistently worse than PM proves that the AM is not producing a fair measure of candidates' abilities.
My 2 cents.作者: jcole21 时间: 2011-8-24 23:23
I am on the side of CPK123, I don't know what happened in the morning. I thought I did better than that but boy was I smoking some cheap stuff. I know I missed a whole question but overall I thought I answered the rest fairly well.
Need to clean up a few areas for next year.作者: SpyAli 时间: 2011-8-24 23:30
I'm in the same boat - got 6 < 50% in AM, rest 50-70%. And I thought I had it down cold after solving CFA mock, schweser practice tests, old CFA exams and BSAS mock. Pretty confused with the results. Go figure.作者: Zestt 时间: 2011-8-24 23:35
Same here: I was surprised, not by the low marks, but by the consistency of the distribution of the low marks. If i had not opened the books till the last couple of weeks, i would have understood. My AM and PM were almost complete opposites. It should be impossible (over a large sample) to do a good PM and an abysmal AM consistently: a level III black swan event perhaps.
While i accept that i may have given different answers to those required, nothing you can do about this, and i do believe the margin of error in these exams is very fine, i am nevertheless concerned ( in terms of the future probability of having the same event happen again) over the apparent lack of randomness with respect to the outcomes. Obviously i do not have the full sample to hand and this might be clearer if we did, but we are right to question any outcome that is significantly different from that expected: a fail might have been within the realms of probability, but the distribution of marks between AM and PM (you usually know when you have "really" messed) and the consistency of the AM marks may well be outside our confidence intervals.
I guess the point people are making is that they feel that the Am section marks are individually more than 2 standard deviations outside the average expected result.
I was the best prepared of all three levels having completed the curriculum this time: the first 2 levels i passed without completing the course. While i have never done any of the mocks or sample tests at any level, i do not think you need to do these to pass, as long as you know the curriculum and understand it.
Really, the AM made me look as if i did not have a clue, with the exception of the 70% on the Inst PM, which i answered more or less at the same level as most other questions in the AM: why would one randomly (like a monkey at a typewriter) come up with the correct answer in one section and miss the script entirely elsewhere? Perhaps the margin of error is too fine.
I do think the AM is harder though if you find the course at times divorced from market and economic reality, and hence disagree with the fundamental belief of efficient markets and general equilibrium on which much of the course is predicated. You do have to hold your breath and quietly bang your head against the wall, at times, while pretending to believe that we are at equilibrium and that MVOs, monte carlo, michaud resampling and everything else will realistically represent the boundaries and realities of the market and economic universe we are in.
While it is a very rigorous and extremely valuable course and correctly provides you with many of the tools and structures to manage portfolios within a close to normally distributed general equilibrium model, it does not really allow you to question it. Nevertheless, if we are doing the course we need to accept that is the CFAs beliefs and disciplines that we are agreeing to be tested on, and not our own. In other words, we have already accepted our fates just by signing up for the course. We can question the credibility of our fate, but we cannot complain about it.作者: jcfa2011 时间: 2011-8-24 23:41
this is really helpful. Thanks to all. For me, I don't get it either. I wonder if it could be the keywords? This never occurred to me. I answered everything the same way and that could have been the reason. I got most in the 51% - 70% range - which is still considered poor by CFA - but none >70%.... and like others, a few in <50% including Asset Allocation. If that was the gold one, I expected this but not the others. Well onward and upward.作者: badonkus 时间: 2011-8-24 23:47
Doesn't say much about the program and the quality of the test if the absolute majority scores low in most of the essay q's . Just reeks of ambiguous wording and subjectivity. My PM looked fabulous , but the AM was a disaster. How is that possible?作者: RepoToronto 时间: 2011-8-24 23:53
Unfortunately, This level does not measure the candidate's intelligence/ability & knowledge. To me, the exam pattern level is not upto the mark for CFAI's reputation. Will attempt again and pass for sure, but will not be proud of clearing this exam ever, unlike level 2 where I secured > 70% in every area except ethics/econ.
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at Friday, August 19, 2011 at 02:22PM by cfamba2011.作者: genuinecfa 时间: 2011-8-24 23:59
I'm going to play devil's advocate here and say that L3 more than any other level maybe tests a candidate's not only knowledge but ability to synthesize the textbook material, think quickly, and then be concise and to the point when it comes to answer articulation. An essay test is far harder than multiple guess. You can't back into anything. You can't blindly guess. It is far more like the real world where you not only need to make good decisions, but you need to get your point across well. There are plenty of study materials out there for practice on L3 AM tests, more so than any other level, and free from the CFAI. If you bomb the AM, chances are you underestimated the difficulty of the essay part of the test or didn't express yourself briefly and to the point. Thankfully for those who fail, you will get published the exact exam to study and learn from. Once you see their guideline answers, take a look and you'll realize quickly that this is a fair test, just a very tough one. Many people who breeze through 1 and 2 get tripped up on 3. It is a completely different animal, not to be underestimated. Learn from your mistakes and you will have a huge leg up on 1st time takers next year having sat through one in real-time conditions and stress. You can't hide from the AM section- the key is to just survive it. Cut your losses sometimes on questions, turn the page, and have a very strong understanding and plan of attack for both the individual and inst. IPS q's.作者: joehogue 时间: 2011-8-25 00:05
..the more i read about L3 the more i shake作者: lunarfollies 时间: 2011-8-25 00:11
I think people have to remember that >50 for some people may be 0 and for others it may be 45 that is a huge difference. The AM part of the Exam was by far the most difficult part to study for and was also my lowest scoring by a long shot.
my $.02 , on what worked for me.
I put in allot of practice on the AM, I had many of the "canned answers" memorized and could write out everything very fast. I memorized all of the key language in the guidline answers, "full credit" answers that Schweser gave. I worked hard on writing all of my Port Mgt answers in a consistent easy to follow and understand spreadsheet format similar to how CFAI does it. Remember the graders look at the guideline and then look at your answer the easier to read and closer it looks to guideline the more partial credit you get.
Many of the old exam answers I wrote over and over again knowing if I ever got a question on a similar organization or person I would be able to bang out the answer. I figured this may give me time for a curveball question or to review and I did finish almost 1 hour early. This also got my arm in shape my hand was not very tired during the exam.
I brought in a blue and black pen (graders use red, don't ever use red it pisses them off) I did everything in black but I circled all answers in Blue. When I did a formula I used arrows in blue to label every input, I made sure every step was clear. I also went back and made sure every answer was clearly marked.
Looking at my scores every part that I scored >50% for a fact I wrote down the formula and or RRLLTU, etc and calculated something (obviously wrong) but I must have decent credit not zero.
I had 3> 50% and 4<70% but I'm pretty sure I got 100% on 2 or 3 of those questions so in some cases the essay helps.作者: chunty 时间: 2011-8-25 00:17
janakisri Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Doesn't say much about the program and the quality
> of the test if the absolute majority scores low in
> most of the essay q's . Just reeks of ambiguous
> wording and subjectivity. My PM looked fabulous ,
> but the AM was a disaster. How is that possible?
I think there's a fairly straightforward explanation for the low-AM-score / higher-PM-score phenomenon:
In the PM portion, L3 is all multiple choice, so the first 33% of a candidate's score is essentially a freebie: even someone that has never heard of the CFA curriculum should score 33% just by guessing. From there, it doesn't take too much learning (or even luck / random variation) to reach >50%.
In the AM portion on the other hand, most of the questions are written answers, so there are far fewer freebie grades: an unprepared candidate is starting much closer to 0%, and is much more likely to fall short of the 50% mark.
If you look at the score matrices of passing candidates posted on AF, you'll see that for the most part, the distributions of morning scores fairly closely resembles those of afternoon scores.作者: soverby 时间: 2011-8-25 00:23
Sorry but your argument doesn't work because your key assumption for scoring 33% (i.e. random guessing) can not be used for a candidate who, instead of randomly guessing, is trying to select the correct answer.
That is, if you randomly guess, your expected return is 33%. However, if you instead attempt to answer multiple choice questions based on a combination of the provided information and your knowledge, this 33% is no longer relevant and your 'starting point' is back at zero.作者: BC_MBA_student 时间: 2011-8-25 00:29
SFA Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> That is, if you randomly guess, your expected
> return is 33%. However, if you instead attempt to
> answer multiple choice questions based on a
> combination of the provided information and your
> knowledge, this 33% is no longer relevant and your
> 'starting point' is back at zero.
I disagree.
Say that I'm an economist, and each day I need to use available information and my knowledge to predict whether the USD will A) Appreciate, or B) Depreciate versus the Euro.
I'd expect an unknowledgable person to be able to predict this correctly on 50% of days.
By your argument, the professional economist should be measured against a benchmark of 0% correct -- so if he predicts correctly on 25% of days he is a good economist.
I don't think that's right. You need to compare the economist's performance against what one could achieve (50%) by knowing nothing and guessing.
Similarly, on a multiple choice test with three choices, a 33% score should be considered the baseline; that's what performance must be compared against.作者: John10 时间: 2011-8-25 00:41
It is unfortunately not possible to distinguish between the questions you "know you know" and the ones you "know you don't know". I think this is the crux of the issue.
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at Saturday, August 20, 2011 at 01:21AM by SFA.作者: Otabek 时间: 2011-8-25 00:47
My point is that in all of these situations, there is a freebie baseline, that doesn't suddenly disappear if you're "trying" rather than guessing.
Another example:
The return performance of a large-cap PASSIVE portfolio manager is expected to be on-par with the return of the S&P 500. The passive manager is not trying to beat this expected performance.
A large-cap ACTIVE manager on the other hand is trying to add value -- in other words, he's "trying" to select superior securities. Should we benchmark him against a 0% return because he's "trying"? Nope. The performance of the S&P is still the baseline; and he only is considered a knowledgable/skilled portfolio manager to the extent that he beats the S&P.
To summarize: same baseline applies, whether you're accepting the expected baseline performance, or trying to beat it.作者: IAmNeil 时间: 2011-8-25 00:53
look, this would work if you could approach each question asking "do I know this 100% for sure?" If yes, then select correct answer. If no, randomly guess. Then you would be correct. But the reality is that we are never 100% sure that we know the correct answer. There is always at least some doubt. Now also consider the case where questions are designed to create additional ambiguity and doubt.
Your perspective is a 'law of large numbers' perspective. I.e. take enough random trials and you will approach 1/n. What I am talking about on the otherhand and what I think is reality for CFA candidates is that for each individual question if we don't have the material down COLD we will more than likely fall for a 'distractor' option and score zero for that question. Also, the correct answer will unlikely present itself as an attractive option to those that are less than fully prepared so for the 'prepared' candidate the chances of unwittingly CHOOSING (not guessing) the correct answer is very small. And that is to say NOT RANDOM.
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at Saturday, August 20, 2011 at 02:35AM by SFA.作者: lucasg85 时间: 2011-8-25 00:59
The problem is that you end up in a circular argument which I think we all have nightmares about... "I think the answer is A, but I am not sure. Since I am not sure, A is likely to be a distractor, therefore the answer must be B or C. What do I do? Random guess: ER = 33%. But if my paranoid reasoning is correct picking B or C yields a ER = 50%. But what if my hunch of A is correct?"
This I hope illustrates the difference between randomly guessing and having some idea what you are doing. While random guessing should get you close to 33%, having some idea of what you are doing could well get you 0%.作者: ruchita 时间: 2011-8-25 01:05
speaking of economics, have you guys noticed that stuff (e.g. burritos) keep getting smaller and crappier? Could this be disguised inflation (i.e. instead of price going up, products just keep getting smaller and crappier)?
