Hello, let’s commiserate here but more importantly focus on next steps to passing next time!
Yes, the pass rate was low and we were the Guinea pigs for the CBT. This was my first attempt. I did well in some topics then others. I only used KS, which helped at L2 but I’m not so sure about L3. Because I wasn’t too close to MPS I don’t think I can justify the sitting fee for the November date and should focus on May 2022 instead, knowing I will need to buy new prep materials. Should I stay with KS? Other folks in similar situations?
For whatever it’s worth, Chalk & Board worked great for me. I will always recommend them. Schweser had some shortcuts and errors that I would have missed without a second prep provider.
Marc focuses solely on Level 3 and eats, breathes and probably sleeps the material. He will provide you with a roadmap of how to be successful and knock out the exam, but it will be up to you to follow his guidance. If you’re going to take his Bootcamps (which you should) go in having worked the Blue Boxes, watched his videos and read his Slide Books. I didn’t for my first Bootcamp and was trying to play catch up the whole time instead of catching the little nuances that it takes to pass Level 3 (details matter) he teaches.
I’ll say this about Marc as well, he legitimately cares about his candidates. He called me after my first attempt just to tell me everything was going to be OK and get me motivated to attack the exam again. Him texting/emailing you back at what seems like all hours of the night is the norm rather than exception in most cases, and you can tell he’s genuinely excited when he finds out one of his candidates has passed the exam.
Buy his Jumpstart videos and Slide Books a the bare minimum, and follow his roadmap to earning your charter!
I always amazed to see how many users gave high praise to LevelUp here with only 1 comment history.
I know plenty of people who did not use his material that passed (myself included. I watched a couple of his videos and decided his style wasn’t for me) and people who did his bootcamp yet failed.
Like yourself, I also mainly relied on K&S material to pass L2 so I got their L3 package too. However I didn’t get to use it much during the preparation because I realized that they sometime skip or paraphrase materials compared with the original readings, which may be enough for answering MCs but not when it comes to CRs. So I ended up only using the quiz bank during the review stage.
Like many previous test takers have said here, the official curriculum is the best study material for L3. That said I did find doing a ton of practice also helpful in identifying my weak spot. Be mindful that no LO is too small to come up during the official exam.
To be honest, its quite weird to see users with 1-2 comments vouching for a specific provider…
Didn’t make it this time & registered again for November. I’m planning to change my strategy (previously KS for reading & solving CFAI EOC), i found their material quite useful but I do agree that they skip some important content such as (graphs, charts & tables) from the CFAI books.
I did score pretty decent in the asset classes subject but failed / score less in PM & others.
plan to freshly start with the full PM subjects (given my weak areas) and work my way to refresh my strengths subjects.
For the may exam i still used to read books & solve printed version mocks/questions which i plan to change it this time to video’s / soft copies problem solving; kind of to be inline with the CBT test (found it much easier to type vs… write).
I’m planning to do MM or IFT & would like to hear out suggestions based on past experience.
I can see as well a lot of candidates used @S2000magician Mock exams which i plan on taking it down the road as well. from what i hear is that his mock exams are designed in way to make you learn as opposed to feel comfortable and scoring well in mock exams.
wishing all the re-takers best of luck and congrats for the candidates who passed this May!
Also failed Level III this year for a number of reasons which all basically come down to a suboptimal preparation. Studied exclusively with KS which worked great for Levels I & II, but came across questions in LIII exam which were not covered by KS. I was very close to MPS, so my strategy now will be KS curriculum summaries, MM video lectures, CFA question bank and probably some mock exams (never did them for LI and LII).
MM worked great for me in L2 & L3. I cannot recommend him enough! I didn’t even study the curriculum, only his videos, and practiced his mocks and CFAI mocks/practice questions.
I created an account to come here and vouch for LevelUp after I found out I passed L3 this go around. Admittedly, I’ve been coming here every so often to check in on the “pulse” of candidates but never created account as I knew I’d get dragged down rabbit holes while I should be studying.
Teaching style is everything, I used Wiley for L1 and L2 and passed both on my first attempt. However, the instructor that they use for L3 I had a harder time learning from in certain L2 classes. Marc also doesn’t try to “teach” you everything and there’s an expectation that you’re going to do a great amount of work and self study prior to his Problem Solving webinars and Bootcamps. What he does in the Bootcamp is review EVERYTHING (literally everything) and gives you ideas of how to attack every topic and how he thinks it can or would be tested.
I’m not saying LevelUp and the Bootcamps are the only route to go. If you like having (or need) something that automatically arranges lesson plans for you, then LevelUp isn’t for you. I needed something to help me stay organized with my lessons and Wiley had that tool and not staying organized cost me four months of my life after failing L3 in December. I think if you ask the people who took Marc’s Bootcamp, the vast majority would say it wasn’t his fault or lack of covering material they failed (myself included). Also, if you travel a lot, Marc’s videos can be hard to watch from an airplane and/or a hotel as they take quite a bit of bandwidth to load as they’re quite long.
Now that everything is over, I’m happy to help out candidates and return the favor anyway I can
Thanks, the light-blue shaded box easily crossed the MPS, my score didn’t. MM is Mark Meldrum, watched the free youtube videos for LI. They helped to really understand every aspect of the material instead of just memorizing it - even more important for LIII.
I just passed L3. I used KS, IFT & BCIII. I did not use CFAI books and can’t comment.
Like you I use KS for reading & solving CFAI ECOs
But I also watched IFT videos after each reading @ 1.5x speed. I did with KS to double cover. I didn’t use IFT notes.
-I used IFT condensed videos after completing all the readings as a second pass
-Kaplan AM constructed response Qbank was decent to practice AM, PM Qbank is garbage, Quicksheet is sufficient to make flashcards. AM mocks are hot garbage, PM mocks are decent. Their post exam question relevancy document is good, don’t use IFTs it skips a ton of questions.
-IFT Qbanks both AM/PM are pretty good
-IFT Mocks were also fair and quite representative in style & difficulty
-BCIII mocks were the most representative in style/format and his answer rubrics are the best to learn how much to write for the actual exam. Fair warning that the mocks are challenging. IMO to go a little deeper I would say 60% of the questions are representative and 40% are next level challenging, typically I found 1 subpart for each case would be very difficult and one entire case would be left field, but they are still fair game and teach you potential tricks that could show up. But it’s not like every single question is super hard. I just wanted to make that distinction since a lot of people just say in general that his exams are harder. I scored lots of mid 50’s to 60 but the reason was mainly that I would score near 0 for one entire question but would score 70+% on other questions
I scored ~70% on PMs, above 80% on Fixed Income, between 50-70% on Derivatives, AI, and Eco. Failed Equities ( below 50%), and completely failed Ethics (below 30%).
So annoying and absurd, that bc of Ethics failed an entire exam.
Similar for me. 3 time above 70% 3 times around ~ 60%. Failed Econ (I have a PhD in Economics) and Ethics…
Fully agree on comment on Ethics. In particular, as we all have already shown twice that we passed Ethics. Content is the same as in Level 1 and 2.
I totally agree with your sentiment. I am a CAIA charterholder and have had a strong dose of Ethics in both levels there in addition to CFA. I scored btw 50-70 in ethics which left me dumbfounded. I don’t think the problem lies with the candidates, the problem lies in the exam questioning. It appears more to trick you rather than actually test your knowledge of the subject.
When I prepared for L3 in December of 2020 I had access to essentially all prep providers. What worked for me was essentially following the tips prescribed in a book called ‘Make it Stick’ I made flashcards on Quizlet (using the snip function in windows 10 to create them quickly and elaborate on them with time - Window + Shift + s) I also did quizzes daily on all readings already covered (in one quiz). Likewise, i did all of the qbanks, mocks, blue boxes, and in text examples. I know a lot of folks here liked level up but it didn’t do it for me. I got the most utility from Bill Campbell’s mocks and MM qbank + mocks. Both of those resources were really great when it comes to explanation as to why something was wrong or right.
How did you get your detailed score? Ethics wasn’t my strong area for L1 and L2 , i put in an inordinate amount of time for L3 , i did manage to pass the exam but i would have been nice to know how i did on Ethics
