((this post may need to be moved to a sub-forum))
This is a long one, but will hopefully help someone:
I took the live class of Becker Audit in October 2009. I sat for the exam in November and passed with a 94. I had no working audit experience and it had been 8-ish years since I had my audit classes. One of the big questions Ive seen people asking in the short time Ive been reading is how to study and which review materials to use. I cant speak towards the other materials, but thought Id share my thoughts on the Audit portion of the Becker materials.
Overall the Becker Audit materials are a fair representation of the AUD test. There may have been 3-5 questions that I can say were not covered directly in my study materials and those could very well have been the pre-test questions. The simulations given in the Becker software gave a good mechanical feel to the types of simulations I saw in the exam. There are so many possible topics and/or ways the simulations can test I dont know that it is possible to cover everything in the practice simulations. That being said, the Becker materials had about 2 simulations per class (5 class X 2 = 10 simulations) plus two simulations in each of the practice exams (total around 14 simulations). Given that Becker has been around for ages I am not sure why they couldnt have an extra 10-25 simulations available. I did download an update that put one of the AICPA released simulations into the Becker software. The same thing applies to the written as the simulations. I would love to have just had questions and answers to read through. Reading through the good solid answers in the ones available was helpful, I just wanted more of them.
I questioned the style of the lectures after my first couple of classes. The lectures mostly revolve around the lecturer reading chunks out of the book and telling you to highlight and/or underline certain parts and other notes in the margin. At times I was busy highlighting or writing and missed parts of what was said. I would have preferred the book already have the arrows, notes, and highlights/underlines, but I understand having me (the students) do it is part of the learning process. I still think I got more out of the examples and explanations of things moreso than the mechanically highlighting, but each person learns differently.
There is a question people ask that I havent seen a good answer on is how do I study? People spend a lot of time telling people how much they studied, but I didnt see many answers detailing the how. This was important to me as I never really had to study much in college to get good grades (I was lucky). So, how did I study using the Becker AUD? I read the material and answered the multiple choice questions prior to going to the class (shot for 70-80%)%). I then went to the class. The day after the class I would work all the multiple choice questions (including supplemental) (shot for 90% but often got 85-90%). I would also work the prior class multiple choice questions (here is where I was firmly in the low-90%s).
Maybe less confusing version:
Saturday: read the following Mondays class material and work prior weeks simulations
Sunday: read the following Wednesdays class material and work MC questions for upcoming Mon/Wed class
Monday: class
Tuesday: work Mondays MC questions and previous Wednesdays MC questions
Wednesday: class
Thursday work Wednesdays MC questions and that weeks Monday MC questions
Friday: night off
Basically I was constantly doing the current class and previous class questions as I moved through the material. The weekend would do the prior weeks simulations and answer the upcoming weeks MC questions.
When doing the MC questions I might get the answer extremely quickly (especially after seeing the questions a ton). I didnt stop with getting the right answer. Before I would look at the answer I would try to explain why the other answers were incorrect. This is important as the actual exam might ask a question on the specific content from a different angle or slightly different situation. By explaining why the incorrect answers are incorrect it allows you to think through things so when you see the same type, yet different facts it is just like what you studied.
This process basically means I went through the material twice; once before class and once in class. I went through the MC questions three times; once before class, once right after class, and once a couple of days after class. The simulations each got one pass through them. During my final review I went through each class MC questions in their entirety yet again as well as read through all the simulations. I then took 4 or 5 practice MC sets (100 questions each pulled from the homework MC questions weighted by content). I finally finished up with the two practice final exams. By time I took the exam I had seen every MC question 4 times plus whichever pulled into the weighted exams and every simulation at least twice.
I almost feel like I could have ignored the book. I didnt memorize the standard audit report verbatim (as recommended). I actually only briefly skimmed the book during my final review. I didnt learn all the mnemonics listed. I did pick out 4 or 5 of the ones I thought were most important (internal controls, modifying previously issued opinion, and a couple of others). Mnemonics are good, but when you have a dozen of them they start to run together and remembering which goes with which concept can get confusing.
Becker AUD Flashcards: I did purchase the flashcards. I figured if I was already spending $3,000 I probably shouldnt be cheap on the last $200 for the flashcards. I found them to be both good and bad. There were some things that were split onto three flashcards that really was a single concept and could have been on one card. Some cards had minor points that was either extremely basic knowledge after listening to the lectures and not worthy of a flashcard. Ultimately I removed many of the cards and kept a core group of flashcards I thought were the most important or areas I felt weak in. I kept about a third of the cards in the set I carried with me to review and the other two-thirds went back in the box. The cards I used were great. If the other classes are of similar quality then they will be worth the $200. On a side note, I did find one incorrect card that had the same answer as the previous card on it. This was somewhat irrelevant since that material had changed due to a recent update anyhow. It was actually a good learning tool for me since I identified the incorrect answer and then thought out and looked up what the correct answer was.
Material that had changed or was being updated and possibly tested on was covered by handouts from the in-class facilitator. He covered the changes and how they might be tested. These updates were presented in the same format as the book. Some of my exam questions were covered by these updates. If you have updates be sure to read them and get the one or two points towards your 75. Do not ignore them.
All in I spent 89.5 hours studying for the AUD test including class time (tracked it on my blog). This time did not count minor 5-10 minute flashcard sessions I did occasionally during my lunch breaks at work (didnt do as many of these as I would have liked, so really minor time investment overall). While taking the actual exam I felt that everything on the exam had been covered. Even the stuff I had issues with I knew and had seen the material.
I took the exam 12 days after the last class. Some people from the class told me I was crazy for taking it that soon, but I would have felt comfortable doing it a week after. I really did not spend much time studying the last 5-6 days before the exam. It was actually nice to do two classes worth of MC questions and be done for the evening instead of spending every waking moment after work studying. The last several days were actually very motivational as I would hop on, do the questions, and score in the 90s and still have 30-60 minutes of conscious spouse time.
On a rant note, half the challenge of the questions was figuring out what they were saying/asking. It was frustrating knowing what concept they were asking about and knowing that concept inside and out but trying to read through triple negatives in the questions and answers was annoying (which of the following does NOT include ..and then double negative in the answer choices).
I hope this write-up will help someone with the exam. The goal is to let people know that the Becker AUD material does adequately cover and give you practice relevant to the exam. I also included how I used the material to assist those trying to formulate their study plan.
AUD-94; REG-97; BEC-93; FAR-94
see how I did it day by day: http://cpa-exam.dalesines.com
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