Benchmark & last 6 weeks gameplan

CFA Level II
#1

Last year:

Band 8. (Bombed ethics & FR&A <=50%). I ran through Kaplan videos in the few months prior, then took a week off before the exam to cram. Fixing those 2 probably would’ve put me over the hump. I was also doing an MBA at the time and ramping into a new job.

This year:

I’ve gone through videos again, started doing EOC questions in CFAI cirriculum for FR&A. I’m trying to make sure I hit the big three and derviatives (Derivates kicked me in the teeth and probably just guessed right to get 51%-70%). My wife’s cousin decided to get married in May, so I’ll be traveling the 2 weeks prior to exam, coming back on Tuesday for 3 day cram session.

Gameplan:

EOC’s like crazy, ignore the playoffs. I see others posting mock scores, but I’m not sure about taking them this early. I don’t want to peak too early (see Spurs win streak last year). I’m thinking spend the next month doing all the EOC’s and the last 2 weeks doing practice exams while one the road and having a few beers at the wedding reception to celebrate before the final week. I’m freaking out a bit, could use some encouragement. This is a good sign though, as I clearly didn’t start worrying soon enough last time.

Comments, thoughts, suggestions? I would love to hear you connect the dots between now and a passing e-mail in July.

#2

Would like to hear where others are as well - I’m going to finish my second pass and then take my first mock. Will decide my remaining few weeks strategy from there…

#3

this is my plan for L2 (first attempt):

feb-march - read all schweser notes, do all concept checkers, challenge problems and self tests

april - Schweserpro Question bank ~ 2000 questions

may - schweser practice exams, cfa practice exams, live mockup, original questions, qbank

Total ~350 hours I estimate.

This strategy worked for me on December level 1 exam - but used slightly less time there ~250 hours as I started too late

I might also run through the end of chapter questions in the original curriculum if time allows, for L1 I didnt look at the original books at all

Any comments?

#4

I might also run through the end of chapter questions in the original curriculum if time allows

#5

I think this is a great strategy for L1 and some L2 sections. I have read the CFAI and half of Schweiser and I find that unlike level 1, Schweiser is a bit brief for some sections and the gap between the level of difficulty for the Schweiser questions and the CFAI curriculum is much wider for L2. I would use the CFAI for FRA for sure and other less quantitative intensive sections like maybe economics and Alt Investments.

I think for equity and derivatives and Quants, Schweiser is fine and I regret reading the CFAI curriculum for these section because I think it unnecessarily complicated Quants and derivatives, but watch yourself on the more theory-based sections.

#6

Good point, will make sure I look at CFAI for the more theoretical sessions. I guess doing the CFAI questions and looking in the text to answer them is a “quick way” of seeing what schweser missed there?

#7

For Level 1 I thought Schweser practice exams had more difficult questions then the CFAI practice exams though…

#8

The difficulty gap I was referring to was between the QBank and the Schweiser question in the texts(I should’ve been more clear). The Schweiser mock exams were a great indicator of the real level 1 test difficulty. I haven’t done any CFAI Mock exams so I can’t compare there.

#9

Ah, I see, yes, Qbank is relatively easy, the text questions needs to be done as well