PBOR pass mark

Is there any idea of the pass mark for PBOR?

I’m assuming the written paper would still be around the 60 mark and a combined pass mark to be 60ish as per previous papers?

Or is it possible to pass one and not the other even if your weighted average is higher than 60% e.g get 50% in PBOR and 75% in written paper ?

Please correct and advise

Thanks

 

Does it mean that we can pass overall just by getting full marks in the written paper but a very low mark in the practical paper?

Let's say the pass marks is 60 for CM2. One get 90 in CM2A and 10 marks in CM2B. Now the weighted aggregate is 70% of 90 + 30% of 10 = 66 that is above the pass marks. So the candidate will pass CM2?

 

I think it's possible. But if you can only get 10% on Paper B then the chance you can get 90% on Paper A is probably pretty slim!! I'd stop worrying about it and just try and get as many marks as possible on each paper.

 

I wouldn’t believe anything Acted or the IfoA say. Please see other comments on this forum regarding pass mark. The ifoa chop and change this without clear guidance. One poster had something like a 33% difference in his mark and the pass mark set by the Ifoa is shrouded by secrecy. Another poster also had his mark fudged since he made a complaint to the IFoA. I’m personally dubious about my grades. Make sure you make a subject access request so you get some more detailed information

 

My query is regarding the PBOR material. I am a CT8 retaker and had ordered both revision notes and ASET and have prepared for Paper A.
I had assumed the paper B material will also be covered in those, or I can get access to VLE since I have ordered both these materials.
Can you please help and guide if it possible to get access to Paper B problems without ordering more study stuff.
Thanks

 

Thanks for your prompt reply.
I have prepared for Paper A using the ASET and revision notes (which includes all the questions form CT6, CT1 or CT7) added to the new course.
Yes the paper B is left to the end. I understand it will be excel application of the concepts learnt in paper A. Hope I can cover up in a the next week. Can you recommend how much practice is required for paper B.
Will the specimen on IFoA website suffice? I dont think the retakers module can arrive in time for me.
I really expected the ASET and Rev notes will eventually give me access to paper B material as well. This is a bit of disappointment that I will need to order another set of study material for paper B.
Can I request access to VLE platform for sample online problems please?

 

Why would Acted have to speculate what the pass mark is? Is IFoA unable to create exam papers that come with a stable fixed pass mark such as the Indian Actuarial Institute manage to do, why?

 

The specimen on IFoA website can help give you an insight to what to expect in CM2B. Hard for me to say if that would suffice, it also depends on your prior experience with Excel. For me, I feel this is a relative non-issue because multiple modules in NTU cover the use of Excel.

The Core Material Pack for CM2 comes with the Paper B access. It contains 3 questions for each of the CM2 topics (except Efficient Market Hypothesis lol), with worked spreadsheets (so 60 questions total) plus a recap document for using Excel. I feel that the general idea is to get a feel of what kind of questions can appear, then you structure your spreadsheet well so that it makes workings easier to perform and also easier for the markers to follow your work.

Maybe if you could look from the perspective of CT6's EBCT where you put a credibility factor on the pass mark of prior CM and CS papers, of which there are none... so the credibility factor is obviously zero and hence the pass mark must be estimated entirely from other data e.g. the pass marks of the CT papers of the old syllabus. I guess at least those who got CT6 without CT4 won't need to do this topic again.

 

What has previous pass marks of now defunct subjects have to do with it? Are you commenting from a position of knowledge of how IFoA determine pass marks, if so please explain.

 

No, I'm saying that this is how ActEd determined the answer to the original question by zimact92. I believe the pass mark for each paper seems to follows a random distribution that probably includes factors such as how difficult the paper is, the students' actual performance on it (past and present sittings), upper/lower bounds and others that only the IFoA knows - the exact model used shouldn't matter. Only when we complete this sitting will we/they know some of the stuff such as the students' actual performance on the A and B papers, then they can run certain analyses with the newly obtained data (think CS2's Machine Learning - hyper-parameters in particular, as the estimates for these can significantly affect a model) and hence determine the pass mark.

Such as simulating X runs of a random process from certain topics either with pre-set random numbers or Excel's Rand() function.

But what's more important is to simply study hard for them so that you can pass regardless of how high the actual pass mark turns out to be, right?

 

Aim for 100% because no one knows what the pass mark will be?

 

This shows there is no objective standard being set or tested as the pass mark is a function of student performance.

 

Thank you. So the PBOR access will be available immediately since its through VLE, right?

General suggestion - Students / re-takers already buying multiple materials for CM2 (which are NOT inexpensive!) should be able to get access to the PBOR since the intention is to pass the exam as a whole and not need to buy separate revision materials (just like in case of Y series etc).
I feel an extra 100 quid spent on PBOR is not quite fair.