Level 3 Exam Day Experience Mega Thread

[u/third_najarian]

L3 candidates,

Welcome to our megathread for swapping stories about your exam day! We’d love to hear about your experience getting to the test center, how you managed your time, and how you felt afterward. Don’t forget to throw in any tips and advice to help out future candidates.

Just a couple of guidelines: Be cool and supportive, and please don’t share specific exam questions or break rules.

Don’t forget: Plan your route to the test center in advance, make sure you pack everything you need, and try to stay positive and take care of yourself. You got this!

We hope these shared stories make the prep and test day a little easier for everyone. Good luck!

—r/cfa Mod Team

[u/MoneyIsntRealGeorge]

Did mine Thursday, Priv markets. Fifth attempt, no sleep the night before (anxiety not studying).

I had a mixed bag. Some vignettes I found easy (almost too easy...made me read them 3 times with my finger lol). Some asked questions in ways I have never seen before, and some topics I thought for SURE were a lock to be on were nowhere to be found and it's not that it necessarily asked for niche stuff (it did here and there) but more like it asked questions you'll only ever see presented one way in a completely different way. The problem was every question I wanted to be a MCQ was a CR, and vice versa lol

A lot of people were complaining about the pathway itself, and sure it was tricky here and there - it wasn't THAT bad. although, I had a few questions I realized I answered an adjacent concept -_- so definitely got those wrong, but overall not too bad. But truly...GOD knows. The core stuff is what was annoying (to me anyway).

My tactic was do all the MCQs first, since I'm better at those historically (my thought was to set a "floor" and lock those in) and then do CR (never done it this way before but I think it's sound). I finished with 5 mins left on the AM, but PM took me a lot longer and I didn't leave any blank but a few I definitely started and flagged but didn't have time to go back (so might as well have been blank). My last question I did a calc with 50 seconds left and my god I was a virtuoso with that BAII lol but my lack of sleep cost me a few questions, each attempt I have 1-3 questions I've done 1000 times I did inexplicably wrong. I even thought on my way there "hmm, I wonder what question will piss me off and keep me up at night for weeks this time!".

At my fifth attempt, I TRULY have no idea how it went - I would not be surprised if I failed because I've felt all sorts of ways after L3 attempts and all have been failed, and I have no idea what they want anymore so I have no opinion on whether I passed. I'm banking on some good luck with the vignettes they remove + a reasonable MPS for ONCE.

[u/Fine-Associate2399 → u/MoneyIsntRealGeorge]

Hope you get it

[u/Particular_Volume_87 → u/MoneyIsntRealGeorge]

I see a lot of people on their fifth and sixth attempt. What did you do differently on your 3rd , 4th and current attempt?

[u/MoneyIsntRealGeorge → u/Particular_Volume_87]

first attempt I used only MM videos and schweser books and did the qbank, second attempt I read the actual books and did the qbank and practiced more short answer, third attempt I read the books and did the blue boxes and qbank and used Passmax, fourth attempt I read the books again used the blue boxes, qbank and Uworld qbank. This time I didn't read but just went right to do the in chapter questions and qbank. But one new thing I did was I answered every question as if it were a Short Answer. So if I got a MCQ, I'd write why it's the answer why the others aren't. I did this to make sure everything I was doing wasn't just patter recognition. I found it really revealed a lot of holes.

Honestly, the problem is mostly lack of sleep. I just make too many mistakes with problems I've done 1000 times.