September 2006 Exam

Sooooo, how did everyone get on?

I thought that question on ratios was absurd. Fair enough, the examiners will argue that ratios were mentioned in the notes, and its a fundamental tool in performance evaluation and blah blah blah but ratios were taught and examined in the accounting exam. Do they really expect us to keep with us all the knowledge that we have accrued throughout the examination period and even beyond into our actuarial career? I thought it would be more realistic to demonstrate that we can learn and understand it once with the assumption being that when we are required to call on that knowledge in our careers we will be able to refer to notes, books, colleagues, whatever and get up to scratch as we need. Does anyone agree with this? Or am I just kidding myself and making excuses for not having a great memory?

They might counter by saying that ST5 calls on knowledge of earlier subjects and all students should have a thorough grounding of this material but I think that misses the point. I've got a good understanding of my times tables but I wasn't expecting to be eamined on them. There was plenty of numerical material to examine in the ST5 course that was actually taught in the course. There were 20-odd chapters to learn and I'm sure that many of you, like me, eat slept and dreamt those chapters for x weeks leading up to the exam. To come across a 14 mark question on a topic that I hadn't actually studied was a real smack in the face. It gave a big advantage to those who have studied accounting more recently which is unfortunate in my opinion.

You might think this is a disproportionate reaction to a relatively trifling thing but having just gone through a kind of purgatory in ST6 where the examiners are clearly not examining the course they are setting I'm starting to get a bit narked with them.

 

I agree that the question on accounting ratios fits better with 108 (or CT.. whatever!) but I managed to struggle through it anyway. The preceeding question on payouts caused me much greater concern...what was that about!

I also thought that the scope of the exam was very limited and seemed to examine only a small proportion of the course, which was very frustrating given the amount of time I spent learning the course.

 

It may not be politically correct to say so, but I think this is totally out of order, bringing up topics from subjects that you might have studied several years ago. Fair enough if it's pointed out that material from previous subjects might be examined, in which case, a refresher ought to be included in the core reading for the current subject.

Acted often say these tangential examination questions are "fair game" but I disagree. If studying to be an actuary only took 3 years, then I'd be more inclined to agree, but I certainly don't keep all the files I've ever done for every exam. Isn't the point about these exams not that you remember how to do everything you've ever studied forever, but that you know about it and can quickly remind yourself if you're in a work situation that requires it.

This exam is probably going to have a high number of passers that happen, by chance, to have recently looked at these ratios, even if it was just for 5 minutes, which seems to me to be very unfair. It'll be a "make or break" question and the examination of actual ST5 material will be irrelevant.

I didn't do this particular exam, so I think I'm being pretty objective. However, I have come across similar situations. I remember an exam where the question was not in the current syllabus but was in the equivalent exam when the exam system changed for the next session (as I realised when I had to retake it).