astanfo
offlineMember
so I've taken all the sections and Reg twice. The first time I barely knew reg, this time i was getting 80's - 90's on the MC questions in the Becker homework review yet some how I got the same score of 70. Am I missing something? For all the people on here who've taken these tests over and over what do you do about your review materials expiring? Should I be using a different review course?
eldub
offlineMember
@ThunderFan0 - you perfectly described my experience. I believe I found my research question at least, but it was something that both Becker and my NINJA notes said was an absolute ("must") situation, and the research question very clearly wanted me to find the exception. Then, one of the other sims tested details for that same situation (detail beyond what the research tab had of course). Very frustrating.
Thank you to @ckizna and @Lynlea for at least giving me some hope that the MCQ's might carry me.
nolifecpa
offlineMember
@astanfo
are you getting 80's and 90's in mcq because you understand why the answers are correct/incorrect? or are you starting to memorize?
if you gave it your all with becker than i would switch materials, it just may not be for your learning style. we all learn differently and what works for others may not work for you. try samples of other review courses and see what you like
davecpaanderson
offlineMember
@ astanfo
I hear you, when you question if you should use different review materials. From my personal experience I initally used Becker and did not get positive results on FAR or AUD. I then switched to Yeager and the NINJA notes and had success with AUD, but again not with FAR (did not initally purchase the notes, in my opion a big mistake). I am now back on Becker as my firm offered to pay and bought the remaining NINJA notes that I needed. So far, this has led me to pass two parts.
So in short, for me it was not necessarily the review course that gave me the best advantage, but a combonation of my notes from Becker, the NINJA notes and problems from the Wiley book (my past experience with this book has been positive as their questions are closer to what has been on the exam for me and also gives me more practice). I am not sure if this has been your approach, but give it a shot as I was close to giving up thinking I was never going to pass, but in reality all I needed was a different approach than I had been using.
astanfo
offlineMember
Hey guys thanks for the responses yes part of the problem is I started to memorize questions. It's funny because when I took Becker in September I was getting 50's-60's then when I started doing the homework again in March I was like wow I don't remember questions like these at all but I was in the 80's - 90's. However I am certain I did start to memorize questions because I could skim the question and still find the right answer.
So my next question is what to do about study materials. I'm a few grand deep into Becker should I be buying new materials for $400-$500 or keep pounding away with Becker? And what is the benefit of the Ninja notes? Should I buy the Wiley test bank too? Are the Ninja notes similar to the Becker text and the Wiley test bank similar to the Becker homework?
davecpaanderson
offlineMember
The NINJA notes are well organized and in my opinion are perfect to any study guide, Becker or Wiley. They are well structured and easy to understand. I consider his notes to encompass 75%-80% of what is on the test (after all the highlighting in Becker it is easy to be overwhelmed by all the material they want you to know). The 25%-20% difference in subject matter I add in from either the Becker lectures or problems I get incorrect.
Since you are a few grand into Becker, I do not recommend jumping ship and going to a different review course. I think you stay with Becker and invest in the notes for one section and the Wiley test bank for one section, this way you are only spending a couple hundred bucks and adding supplemental tools to your Becker study.
In regards to the Wiley test bank, the problems I got from their books were good practice problems that do not veer away from the basics you learn in Becker, but give you exposure to addtional problems you have not seen. Hope this helps.
(tiredmom)
Young Shil
offlineMember
I have passed regulation today by securing a score of 77. I was so scared for not answering the research portion in simulation and the mistake that occured in other simulation in closing seconds. Whatever, I am happy. Now I am attempting BEC tomorrow.
nebraska
offlineMember
took reg for the third time today....at this point i really don't know how to feel about it!
i've mainly been using becker 2011. i have the wiley 2012 book, but i really only used it for the questions. there wasn't a single thing that i hadn't seen in becker, so that was good! the bad part was that i had a hard time remembering all the details. after taking it twice i thought i had a pretty good sense of what i needed to focus on, but of course that all got shot to hell haha. the first two times i took it i was caught off guard by the amount of detailed business law multiple choice questions i had, so this time i brought my b-law a-game. maybe it's just in my mind, but this time it felt like most of the questions were tax. so that kind of sucked. for some reason my mind went on the fritz and i blanked out on a lot of the s-corp stuff....probably because i subconsciously love retaking these tests and having no life?!
in a perfect world i could be able to have both business law and tax completely memorized, but i feel like there's a limit to how much of these detailed things my brain can remember!! all i want is to sneak by with a 75 :) anyway hope this helps someone out there!
smac88
offlineMember
Taking reg tomorow at 12. Studied for about 3 months and feel as prepared as I could possibly be. Does anyone have any last minute pointers for taking the exam or things to look out for? This is my first time taking reg and hopefully my last test for the cpa so any help would be appreciated! Thanks
Texas27
offlineMember
@smac88... I'm in the same situation, taking REG tomorrow for the first time, studied for about 4.5 weeks, feel very prepared, and hopefully it will be my last exam! Good luck tomorrow.
xcaramel03x
offlineMember
I took REG a few days ago, and I felt it was pretty difficult... I flagged 8/24, 8/24, and 10/24 of the MCQs as questions I didn't know (the SIMS felt okay). I'm a tax concentration and I took business law a year ago, so I thought I didn't have to study AS much. I went through the becker lectures and homework problems/sims, and reviewed for about a week, but not very productively.
Does anyone have any comments/encouragement on how they had felt they didn't know 30-40% of the MCQs, but still passed with a 75 (or higher) score??
Panicking...
Samstudies
offlineMember
I took REG yesterday (for the fourth time) and it didn't seem that difficult. So now obviously I'm worried that I totally bombed it. Anyways, this time around I really studied partnerships, AMT and made sure I had the Becker mnemonics memorized and understood what they meant. If I passed this test then I'm done, so I'm crossing my fingers really tightly!!
HustlinHustlin
offlineMember
Ugh. REG was brutal. I was doing ok, but by the third testlet I was questioning the things I really knew. The sims were a total joke.
Not expecting to see a pass.
This exam was like putting a million pins of tiny pieces of information in your head and asking you to pull out one specific item at request.
Sigh.
HustlinHustlin
offlineMember
Hahahahahaha. No.
Well it depends what you think easy is. For the most part, it just forces you to recall really specific bits of information that you glaze over in studying. I am dumb and spent most of my time on the research tab. So I had to guess on the others. Finally found the research portion when I has 10 minutes left. Funny how it always seems to happen like that...
Certified Public Accountant
offlineMember
IMO
I took REG three times and passed 1-3-12. about 85% of my simulations were confined to the ancillary material in Becker. I think because I learned my lesson the first two times I made sure I mastered the ancillary in (all) lectures. trust me.
OR if you use Yeager/Wiley which I finally used to passed, there is no need to do "ancillary" because everything Yeager teaches will show up in the exam in one way or another.
nateseverino
offlineMember
I just took the REG exam this morning. Holy cow. I would recommend studying the SIMS most of all. 1st testlet seemed easy, 2 and 3 seemed hard. So that might be a good sign, or it might be a sign I really have gone nuts as my friends suspect.
I would recommend focusing on sections 1 through 4, as well as contracts and not-for-profits.
hopefully three down.... one to go!!
EpicFail
offlineMember
I took REG in April and recently found out my score. During the torturous wait for the score release I did something I never did with any other section of the exam, I searched the internet to see if anyone else felt like I did walking out of REG and passed.
When I walked out of the testing center I felt like I failed REG. I flagged almost every MCQ for review. The MCQs did get marginally harder, but it also felt like it was repeating questions that I had on a previous testlet. My confidence was shot by the time I got to the SIMS. And the SIMS! The SIMS were nothing like I had studied. NOT AT ALL! I gave it my best guess. I was so upset after taking REG that I considered sending a nasty letter to Becker.
I felt like I failed REG, but I passed with an 84. (Becker, I'm sorry I doubted you.)
I am a horrible test taker. If I can pass, you can pass. Hang in there. If you fail,and I've been there many times, don't give up. Look at what you did wrong and fix it. In my case I set myself up for failure by attending a live lecture review course. In college I slept through lectures. I don't know why I thought a live lecture would work for me. When I changed to Becker Self-Study things clicked for me. I can't study for hours nonstop so the ability to pause a lecture and take a break whenever I want to is key.
I need to stop procrastinating and get back to studying:) Good luck to you all.
(sararad)
samissmiley
offlineMember
Just got back from taking REG and am in a really bad mood.
I think I did decent on the MC, but guessed on all the SIMS except for the research one. I even completely left one blank. The SIMS were on very specific topics and I couldn't even find the answers in the authoratative literature tab. UGHHHHHH looks like this will be another summer spent studying.
stevekoz27
offlineMember
Just got back from REG. Pretty sure I did really well on the multiple choice. SIMs I felt good on a couple and iffy on a few. More importantly, I just poured a tall glass of beer after a month long sabbatical from drinking. Here's to passing!
Cheers!
DETERMINATION
offlineMember
So, I bombed REG (57); did "stronger" on B-Law but choked on everything else. Using Yaeger; Wiley, put in over 300 hours for REG alone but clearly I need to study smarter not harder. So, this time around I got the NINJA notes and, per Jeff's suggestion, I'm using the NINJA approach; going back through the homestudy videos etc. as opposed to just Yaeger's CRAM. I also got Gleim's test bank and their book so I can cross-reference the Wiley material so that I select only the topical areas Yaeger asks us to cover to see what it is I'm not remembering. I'm really hoping the NINJA notes give my study focus because my notes are clearly too voluminous (not succinct/on-point) enough. Watching the homestudy videos YET AGAIN, is TORTURE!! but I'm going to do it. I don't know, what else to do other than this approach. Any pointers would be appreciated.
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