You’re entering the final weeks before your exam – it’s crunch time.
After you’ve learned the basics from your study manual, it’s time to practice and refine your knowledge.
But where do you start? Rather than blindly reviewing every section, you must be strategic about how you spend your limited review time.
Narrowing your focus
The advice we’re about to give may be controversial.
We’ll use Exam FM as an example, but you can apply this logic to any of the prelims.
In theory, all parts of the Exam FM syllabus are important, and you should learn them all. And in theory, you should strive for a perfect score (10/10) on the exam to demonstrate this mastery.
But here’s the reality:
- A passing score is a 6/10 (employers only care about pass/fail, and you can still attain your Fellowship by scoring a 6 on every exam)
- You need about 25/35 questions to pass (reach the ~70% pass mark. You can check historical pass marks on the SOA Exam Results page).
- Not all syllabus topics are tested equally (the SOA gives different weights to each section on the syllabus)
Again, you only need 25/35 to pass. And not all topics are tested equally, so they don’t deserve equal amounts of your attention.
If your two weakest topics are Bonds (15-20% weight) and Interest Rate Swaps (0-10% weight), you’ll have a better return on investment by reviewing Bonds.
This is your framework for how to spend your time during the final review phase. What topics do you struggle with the most? And how likely are those to show up on the exam?
Your homework going into the final stretch:
» Wrap your head around the true goal: get 25 questions correct on exam day (for Exam FM)
» Analyze which topics you struggle with.
Take a full practice test under exam conditions. Which topics do you consistently miss? Analyze your mistakes so you can improve.
If you use GOAL or Adapt, look at which sections you’ve scored the worst in.
Ask yourself “what do I not want them to ask me on the exam?” This will help reveal topics you struggle with.
» Prioritize your weak topics based on how likely they’ll show up on the exam (look at the Syllabus weights found on the SOA website).
» Do targeted practice on those topics – improve in the areas that have the highest return on investment
Your final weeks will generally follow the pattern of: test-fix-test. You will do practice tests to diagnose weak points and use the syllabus to prioritize areas of improvement. Iterate until exam week – but make sure to avoid burnout before the exam.
For more on effective review methods, check out Actuarial Exam Tactics: Learn More, Study Less.
Study Smart, Pass Fast, Live Life
Mike & Roy