So yesterday I finally passed the SIE exam. This exam has defeated me time and time again but to be honest I don’t think i studied properly with the other 3 attempts. After reading several post from this thread, I came up with a plan to pass this thing once and for all.
First things first- I used Kaplan study materials. My exam was April 25 and started studying April 15th ( I felt like i didn’t need to study for 3 or 4 weeks since I already knew the bulk of information because I took the test so many times).
I started with Capital Advantage Ken’s Finnen videos on YouTube. Don’t get me wrong I have watched Ken’s video before but this time I watched every video in the SIE exam playlist on his page. I binged watched them like it was my favorite tv series. Ken goes through each chapter of the STC study material but I had Kaplan. So I would jump to the video of the chapter I was covering, watch the video, go through each lesson and then take like 3-4 qbank quizzes on that chapter and this was my method. Oh yeah I also would copy and paste some learning material I couldn’t understand into chatgpt. I would ask to chat to explain To me like I’m in the 8th grade ( sad I know but it worked) . I started to understand the concepts a lot more.
On April 23 and April 24 I took 2 simulated practice exams in Kaplan. My average score was 75-77. ChatGPT also mentioned : in order to pass you can only miss 20 questions but have to get 60 questions correct. There are 10 filler questions on the exam that are NOT counted. These questions are anomalies to see if FINRA will add to future exams. So your really only tested on 75 questions not 85 and you won’t know which questions are the anomalies. So for example, if you get 60 questions right but 10 are those are filler questions, you correctly answered only 50 questions which is not passing.
So during my exam, I used the scratch pad provided in the test center and tallied up the questions I knew for sure I got correctly for sure. Then I wrote the number down that I knew I didn’t know the answer too. When I was done with all 80 questions, I wrote numbers down for 18 questions that I know I didnt know the answer too- at that point I knew I passed. I was confident when I submitted my exam that I passed. Another issue I had when taking my exams previously, I was going back in my exam and changing answers. I didn’t do that that this time I was confident.
I hope this helps someone. This post is for any of you that may feel defeated because you keep failing. Remember your success may be delayed but its not denied😉