Secret Keys to Passing the CPA Exam

I found out I passed the CPA exam in it's entirty the Tuesday before Thanksgiving. It was the best feeling. Still is actually. I still feel as though I am living a dream everytime I think about it. A smile will appear across my face with the realization that I finally achieved my goal after years of trying.

When I say years, I mean YEARS. It was a goal that I was trying to achieve since 2006! 5 years later I finally did it. It was a very long journey for me. I hope it doesn't take everyone this long, but if it seems to be taking forever for you to reach the finish line remember you are NOT alone.

I shared this information with my #twudygroup family after I found out I passed but some other friends did not. Everyone said that my story and journey were beyond motivating. I want to help motivate other candidates who are going through this journey that seems to never end.



As you can see from the graph, I my first Notice to Schedule (NTS) was issued on April 7, 2006 and my last NTS was issued on June 30, 2011! I sat for my final exam on November 12, 2011! That's 5 years 8 months that I studied pretty much non stop!

My first passing score ever was FAR. Followed shortly by REG then AUD. A long time elapsed before my passing BEC score, as you can see. In the time between passing FAR the first time and finally passing BEC I lost my FAR credit followed by REG credit shortly after. It was heart breaking. Yes I curled up into a ball and wanted to be invisible to the world when I lost the credit I worked so hard for. But not for long. I was too strong to let that bring me down. The most time I took away from the studies was 3 nights. I emerged from my own world, told myself to keep going, and applied to take the lost sections again! Then I started studying again, every morning, every night and every free second I could find. I listened to audio review all day, every day at work. I had to make sure my studies were first in my life.

If I didn't keep at it I would have lost AUD as well. My ultimate goal was to NEVER have to take BEC again. (Me and BEC were archenemies since the day we met!) I knew I passed the others and could do it again and I did. I "purposely" (not so purposely) let REG expire while I was trying to pass FAR the second time. It was a hard decision. I set up a timeline and I knew I just didn't have enough time to study and remember everything that was tested in FAR in the short amount of time before REG expired. I knew I passed REG once and could do it again. While it was heartbreaking to see "expired" next to my passing score, I know I made the best choice in my journey. It paid off, I passed FAR and REG without any other credit expiring.

The whole CPA exam process is a very draining process!  It took everything I had to pass. It takes hard work and dedication. I gave it my everything. Shoot for that magical 75!

Here are what I believe are the secret keys to passing the CPA exam:

• Don't over study. All you need is a 75
• Don't ever give up even if you feel you don't have anymore to give, give more
• Believe in yourself and abilities
• Hard Work
• Dedication
• It's a marathon, not a sprint. Be in it for the long haul.
• Don't get discouraged.
• Join #twudygroup They are the BEST motivational friends! (Plus we're fun!)

After I figured out the keys to passing I was able to do it! Here is the proof! My final scores!

Now I'm in a waiting game with the State of Pennsylvania. I will keep you updated on my application status. Good Luck studying.

How to Study for the CPA Exam

While studying for the CPA exam I realized how important it was to have a set study method plan. It's crucial to being able to retain all the information tested. Finally figuring out what study method worked for me is what helped me pass. In the beginning of my 5 year long CPA exam journey the way I was studying was all over the place. My Study Plan and Over and Over and Over Again! blog posts lay out what finally worked for me. But everyone is different, right? Everyone has different study methods.

One of #twudygroup friends, Posty, said he learned a lot from my study method but he adapted it for how he studies. He was able to pass FAR and AUD on his first try by using the "Posty Method" and motivation from all his #twudygroup friends. He agreed to be a guest blogger on several #twudygroup CPA exam blogs. You may have read this on another blog. But I believe it's important to review different study methods, find what works best for you, or combine different aspects to form what works best for you.

Here's the "Posty Method." Thanks for Sharing, Posty! Good luck with the rest of your journey. I can't wait to hear you are "Posty, CPA!"

A few #twudygroup friends have asked me what my study method is. So without further ado, I present to you the Posty method:

Disclaimer:  Everyone is learns differently. I am simply sharing what has helped me pass FAR on AUD.

1.       Watch Roger CPA Review lectures straight through.  (1-2 weeks)

Watch the full review course from start to finish.

Do NOT stop to do homework problems. Focus on learning the material. Only work the questions that Roger does during the lecture.

Take intense notes as you watch the lectures. If your hand isn’t hurting, you’re probably not taking enough notes. Don’t worry about pressing pause to get everything written down. Roger is a fast talker!

2.        Do every MCQ in the Wiley book twice.  (2-4 weeks)

A good goal is try to do 100 MCQs a day. Some days you won’t make it. Some days you’ll do over 100 MCQs. Don’t get discouraged.

Be sure to read the Wiley solution in the back of the chapter. Even if you got the problem right, read the solution anyway. It will help enforce the concept. If you got the question wrong, understand why you got it wrong. Albert Einstein said you don’t really understand a concept unless you can explain it to your grandmother. Don’t move on to new problem until you can do this.

Grade yourself while you do these questions.

3.       LIVE in the Wiley Test Bank.  (2-4 weeks leading up to the exam)

Start by doing 20 MCQ tests over 1 topic only. Go through each topic, starting with your weakest area and moving on until you have completed all topics. Don’t move on to a new topic until you score at least a 70%.

Then, start doing random 20 MCQ tests over all topics until you curse the day you decided to become a CPA… and then do some more. Again, a good goal is to get 100 MCQ done per day. Try to do at least 3 TBS a day in the Wiley Test Bank.

Always hit “Not Seen Yet” before each test to ensure that you’re getting questions that you’ve never seen before.  Do these MCQs and TBSs in Study Mode, so that you can get automatic feedback as you work through them.

4.       The week before the exam, do a Practice Exam.

Using the Wiley Test Bank, do a mock exam in Exam Mode. Say you’re about to sit for FAR. Give yourself 4 hours to do 90 MCQ and 7 TBS. This should help you with the time management aspect of the exam.

Good luck!

-Posty

REG Score Release Week & Results

The score release timeline was put into place this quarter. No more waiting until the third week of the third moth of the quarter to find out if you passed an exam that you took the first week of the first month of the quarter. I sat for REG November 12, 2011 which meant I was in the second wave of score release per the timeline. The second wave was set to be released November 21, 2011. That meant in as little as 9 days I would get my scores back!

On one hand it felt as though I didn't have enough time to unwind after I sat before I was wound back up waiting for score release. I was actually sick to my stomach thinking about score release before I even sat for the exam. It really messed with me mentally. But it definitely gave me the motivation to study when I would rather be doing just about anything else.

On the other hand, I really liked the fact that results were released sooner. If you passed you could move on to the next section to study without having to worry about all the "what ifs." But if you didn't pass, you knew much sooner so you could get back to your studies and take it earlier the next window without having to feel like you didn't get enough time to restudy the material again.

The Saturday before score release I hurt my arm AGAIN! I was actually hoping to get a doctor appointment Monday, score release day, but I was unable to get one until Tuesday. I didn't go to work that Monday since I could barely move my arm. That meant I was able to stalk NASBA on Twitter all day long.  No updates about score release all day! Very frustrating. My stomach was all over the place. I just wanted my REG score. If I passed I was a CPA. If not then I lost AUD and dropped back to a 50% CPA. Where the hell were these scores!?

My husband came home from work and we went to have dinner together.  I turned the computer off to enjoy family time. My phone buzzed with a twitter message from one of my #twudygroup family saying "Scores are out! Good Luck!" Seriously? During dinner? It was 5:30 pm. NASBA is located in TN which meant it was 4:30 pm there. Why do they wait until the end of their business day? Well there went my appetite! I know PA's scores are not normally updated until the following day. Apparently my stomach didn't know that! I told my husband scores were released but I probably wouldn't be able to get mine until the next day. He didn't seem to care, he made us check together before we went to bed Monday night. Nope not up yet.

When we woke up the following morning I had an early doctor appointment. Thank goodness because my arm was in such pain. My husband asked if I wanted to check before my appointment. I had two reasons not to check first thing in the morning. First, it was still before the business day. Second, I didn't want to be crying going to the doctor. Either way I knew I would be crying. My doctor appointment went well. I didn't rebreak anything, which is what I was most worried about. I tore some tissue and need time for it to heal.

You can bet when we came home my husband asked me if I wanted to check for my score. It was around 8:40am. He could tell I was shaking inside. I told him "No, we can do it when you come home from work." That didn't work. He told me to get to the computer and he would check it. He typed in the numbers and hit submit....

It was up! I had PASSED!!!!! He looked up at me. I was hysterical crying. He said, "That's passing, right?" I couldn't even speak I was crying and shaking so hard. He jumped up screamed "You Did It!" He held me for what felt like an eternity while I cried hysterical on his shoulder. I did it. I passed. After all these years of hard work and dedication I finally passed! I finally could say I am a CPA! I'm a CPA! It's so surreal to me. I have been through so many ups and downs in this process. I still can't believe it.

Hey.. did you notice the title of the entire blog changed?

Motivation: Best Friends I have Never Met

Most of the time I am self motivated. I can talk myself into doing just about anything that I really desire. I wake up at 5 am every morning to work out and/or study. I tell people I can't do the fun things that they are doing so I can do what needs to be done. I was able to multi-task during postseason baseball (well just the Division Series since my Phillies were eliminated then) by having my laptop in front of me, completing multiple choice questions, but the games were on the big TV behind my computer. I studied during commercials or when things weren't going well for my team. I am able to watch what I eat to make sure I don't break my calorie bank for the day and ruin the good of my morning workout. But sometimes, I need help. I need people to help motivate me.

Years back I met a wonderful group of friends on the community boards of a weight loss website. It started out with about 15 or so of us emailing back and forth all day every day. Currently there are about 7 of us who are still able to "talk" all day. There are several others who I keep in touch with via Facebook, text messages, cards, etc. When one of us is doing good with our weight loss journey most likely the others are as well. And the same is true if one of us is having a bad week. It just seems to rub off via email.  We help motivate each other. Tell one another to "put the fork down!" Or "Great job working out this morning!" We have what we call our "daily challenges." We let each other know how we did the day before with our eating and exercising. We give each other advice on how to get back on track. Don't get me wrong we are not a bunch of girls who sit around and talk about our weight. We are so close. We are a bunch of best friends who talk about everything and anything under the sun. We let our true voice be heard. We are there to celebrate in the good times and cry with each other in the bad times. They have really helped motivate me to keep me on track with my goals. These are some of the best friends that I have never met.

Earlier this year, I was lacking motivation to continue studying for the CPA exam. I had just received a failing score and credit had expired. I needed something to get me back on track to reach this goal of mine. I just didn't think I had it in me to do on my own. I was getting frustrated and very down on myself for the "failure" and lost credit. (Just for the record, I don't ever refer to a non-passing score as a failure. I study my hardest and sit for the exam. That is not a failure. It's a speed bump!) There is no one I know around me day in and day out that is currently studying for the CPA exam, so having a talk with them about how they are dealing with the situation, well that wasn't an option. I did talk to several of my work friends who are already CPA's and they do help motivate me but not the way I needed to be to stay on track. I googled "CPA candidate blogs." I wasn't a big blog reader.  I came across an amazing CPA candidate blog, SleepOnCPA. She was so inspirational and I felt like I finally found a "friend" who was going through the same things as I was studying. I didn't feel so alone anymore. I kept following it for a few months. I had noticed that she had a post on the side of her blog to follow her and #twudygroup on Twitter. Well I didn't have a Twitter account so I made one. I started following her and figured out what the heck #twudygroup was. (Recently Roger, CPA posted a blog about #twudygroup) After I followed SleepOnCPA, I started to follow other CPA candidates. Suddenly, I wasn't alone in the slightest. I had friends all across the country who were in the same situation as I am. Other candidates waking up early to get to their study time in, staying home all weekend curled up with their CPA review materials, cursing that they don't understand something, etc.

The best part about #twudygroup is that I am fully emerged with other candidates who are in the same situation. We have all become #twudygroup friends. When we don't understand a concept, someone is right there to help you understand it. We share resources, knowledge, and study tips. So when I am exhausted, burnt out and want to give up there are about 15 or more people telling me not to quit. They remind me daily that I can do it. I can reach my goals of becoming a CPA. They give me the desire to study. I am excited for the day I can let my #twudygroup friends know that I am a CPA! #twudygroup friends are some of the best motivating friends that I have never met!

Crisp Autumn Day Cuddled up with REG

It's a beautiful autumn day in October. My favorite season. This is what I look forward to all year. A crisp wind is blowing. Leaves are changing. Children outside playing. The perfect day to enjoy outside taking in all the beauty of nature.

Not for this CPA candidate. I am sitting inside. In front of my computer. Window open. Children screaming laughing. All disturbing my quiet study time. I get up to close the window. But before I do that I take one last deep breath of crisp fresh air. What perfect weather to be anywhere but in front of the computer!

This is NOT where I want to be today. I want to be outside. I turn and look at the calendar. Just under one month until my final exam (hopefully). My ultimate goal is to be a CPA. This is the final obstacle standing in my way. Since I already passed it once I know I can do it again. I will be a CPA by the end of this testing window.

Tomorrow I return to work after 6 weeks home on disability with my broken arm. I will need to make my weekends and my nights count twice as much. I will not be able to spend time with my husband as I was able to this past month. I will need to be spending quality time with CPAexcel and Regulation.

What a wonderful and exciting life I lead. Well, it will be wonderful and exciting once I can say I tackled the hardest thing in my life, passing the CPA exam.

Some people dream of success... while others wake up and work hard at it. ~Author Unknown

Slaying REG one handed and getting results faster!

I mentioned in my previous post that this month has not been good and my FAR score was the highlight of my month. While passing any section of the CPA exam would be the highlight of my month, September was not a happy month for me (besides celebrating my 3rd anniversary with my husband. Speaking of my husband, I would not have been able to make it through September - or any part of the CPA exam - without him.)

At the beginning of the month I fell and broke my arm.  I mean really broke it. I had surgery to fix my bones.  I have been out of work since then.  I have not been able to work out. I can't drive. The pain killers messed with my head and made me completely depressed.  I lost about 2 weeks of studying due to my fall.  I don't remember very much while taking it.  I argued with my mom that she didn't come to see me after my surgery for about 10 minutes until she told me word for word our conversation. Oh right, I do remember now. I have emails and text messages that I don't remember sending out. But apparently I did. All I did was sleep and cry. I do remember hooking up my computer and trying to study. Do I remember what I studied? Nope!

I eventually decided that I could handle a little pain to be back into the right state of mind. The doctor said that I could take Tylenol if needed. I decided to stick to the Tylenol.  It took a few days for the prescription medication to get out of my system and for me to feel "normal" again.  When this finally happened I started to study all day long. I didn't even think about it. I knew it was what I had to do if I ever want to be a CPA. I continued on my study plan. Doing questions over and over and over again. Writing index cards. (I broke my left arm. I am right handed.) Writing out all the simulations on my notepad so I could understand the reasoning behind the answers. My arm still hurts but is getting better daily. But the pain of my arm is nothing compared to the pain of not achieving my goals.

At this point in time I still didn't know when I was going to take the exam. I still didn't get my FAR results back yet. So I had to push and learn as much as I could about REG in the time I had. What would happen if I needed to retake FAR?  I would take REG at the beginning of October and FAR again at the end of November. When I got that FAR score it relieved a little bit of stress. I didn't have to retake FAR. I had passed.  So considering I lost two weeks of studying to my broken arm I was able to push REG back without having to stress over the time needed to study. I scheduled REG for November.  But that has not hampered my studies. I still wake up every morning, turn the computer on and start studying for the day.  I am not wasting this time while I have to be home on disability. I am still "working" on my accounting skills. I hope I can go back to work soon. I am not getting paid but the bills keep coming!

I knew the results process of the CPA exam were going to change this quarter.  In prior quarters you had to wait until the third week of the third month of the quarter before receiving your score.  Today the AICPA released a memo concerning the score release for this quarter. This means I should have my REG score by the beginning of December! How nice will it be to enjoy the holiday baking, decorating, shopping and wrapping!

So with one good arm I will use my time wisely to study REG. I will get my score back before the end of December! I'll be slaying REG one handed and getting results FASTER!

Slayed "The Beast" Twice

Financial Accounting & Reporting (FAR) is known as the beast in the CPA Exam world.  It is 4 years of college accounting classes (plus information never learned in college) crammed into a four hour exam. It has the most amount of material covered in any of the four parts of the exam. 

It was the first section I finally passed. I will never forget the day I received my passing score the mail. It was a great day.  But 18 months later, I still had not passed all four sections of the exam, so I lost FAR. I cried and cried and cried. I think I was more upset that I lost FAR then the fact that I didn't pass the last part I was trying for.  All I could think about was the amount of material I had to reteach myself. Not only was it all the information from before, but if you know anything about accounting, you know that accounting rules change and more aspects are added to the accounting world and the exam all the time.  So I had to teach myself all about international accounting.  What the F^&K? I don't work on any international accounts. I work at a mid-sized accounting firm. Yes, I know that doesn't mean I will never need IFRS but 99.9% sure I won't need it while working here. While I like where I work, I am still young and it doesn't mean that I will never change jobs where I could possibly need this information. Beyond maybe needing IFRS in my job, I KNOW I will need those three distinct letters after my name to advance my career no matter where I am working. So I plugged along and learned as much as I needed to know for the exam.

Since day 1 I have been praying and studying HARD at every free second that I came across to pass this exam. I will explain in a later post, but this month (blackout/score release month) has not been a happy one for me. So I prayed more and more for good news during score release week. Some of my twitter friends posted they had received their FAR score before the official announcement from NASBA. I scrambled to find my NTS to check my score. Typing those numbers in and hitting "score" button, I held my breath and closed my eyes. Only to open my eyes and see no score was up yet. Ok breathe. A few hours later the site wasn't working right. I guess it was all the people checking for their scores. But I still closed my eyes and held my breath only to open my eyes with no score or an error processing my request.

I finally stopped for the night and kept plugging away at REG for the night. I was already involved in it. My thought process was even if I need to retake FAR, I am already into REG. Let me keep going.  I woke up the following morning, sick to my stomach thinking about checking my score again because this time I knew it would be available. Here I go again. Type in numbers, hit "score," close eyes, hold breath, open eyes....

Breath let out as a smile came across my face. I am very happy! I slayed the beast twice! All my hard work paid off. But I didn't let my happiness stay too long. I went right back to studying for REG for the day. I know how to pass. So there is no reason I won't pass REG this window!