[LACPA8]

Hi all – This is my first post, but I’ve been a long time lurker since I began the CPA journey.

What a great place to come to for support! Thanks Jeff!

My reason for posting is that I recently sat for the FAR exam for the 2nd time on 7/1/15. The first time I sat for the exam I scored a 73, and felt that I missed a lot points on the MCQ and that my performance on the simulations helped carry me to a score of 73.

Upon sitting for the 2nd time, I felt much more prepared for the MCQ and feel that I did really well this time on the first 3 testlets, but my sims made me feel like I had an unlucky draw on my test. I know I answered my research correctly and feel confident on 3 of the other sims as far as earning a good number of points. Yet, the other 3 sims were probably on the rather more difficult subjects that probably most of us accountants dread.

My question to you all is this: Given that it is known from the pyschometrics publication from the AICPA that scoring on the MCQ is Item Response Theory (IRT) and points are assigned by difficulty of the questions, is it rational to think the sims are graded the same way? The pyschometrics publication doesn’t go into much detail about the simulations other than that they are worth 40%.

I would like to tell myself that the sims are weighted like the MCQ, and that, even though sims are preassigned, receiving harder sims can provide more points, and not necessarily hurt you when it comes to scoring. Perhaps this explains why so many people on here feel that they bomb their sims because of the difficulty, yet receive higher scores than they expected?

I hate thinking that I might have to sit for the beast again simply by getting what I would call an unlucky draw on my simulations.

All responses are appreciated, and once again what an awesome community on here to be apart of here!

FAR 79
AUD - 78
BEC - 8/15
REG - 11/15

[Yukkeko]

I don't know what AICPA actually do, but I have a feeling that the SIM is weighted as percentile similar to MCQ. Just based on my own experience and my friends'.

I got really hard SIM for FAR, and i thought I blew it wide open…but result was quite pleasant. And I also feel that they could throw in one SIM that is the pre-test question (not counting towards your grade)

FAR (4/14/14) - 97
REG (11/17/14) - 94
BEC (11/30/14) - 92
AUD (2/28/15) - 99
TEARS!

[Author]

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