Request for more data centric problems

keshav1996keshav1996
in General

Hi,

CAS, in of it's updates on Excel based exams, mentioned a point worth noticing. It said that the shift to online format will enable it to include more data into questions as calculations become less time consuming in the spreadsheet. It makes sense too. However, all the past exam problems are based on very little data and information provided in questions to balance the difficulty with time constraint.

So, can we have some questions from each chapter where we can have extensive data and calculations to deal with some even involving applications from several areas together? It may be in the format of small question paper to practice, but I am hoping it would help a lot in simulating and practicing under the expected exam environment going ahead.


Thanks

Comments

  • GrahamGraham

    I can see the logic behind you suggestion but the CAS has said that there wouldn't be any immediate changes so I think you're ok for the next sitting.

    The CAS has also not provided any further details regarding changes for the new Excel format. If the only change is just more rows of data, then the calculations would be exactly the same and the old exam problems should suffice for practice. If the changes are more substantial, I would want to wait for further guidance from the CAS before creating new problems.

  • carrotscarrots

    Hello,

    Does this still stand for next sitting? Should we be practicing with more data in case CAS does indeed increase the amount of data to handle?

    Also, maybe a dumb question but it's my first time taking this exam... how does it work with CBT? will the data already entered on an excel sheet so i could go directly into calculating them? and is it like one separate Excel sheet per question or one Excel sheet where I would put in all my answers for each question?

    Thanks

  • GrahamGraham

    You should be able to go to the Pearson Vue site and get access to a sample environment so you can familiarize yourself with how it works. I have not taken an exam in CBT format myself so I can't provide any specific information other than that it's basically like working in Excel. If you look at the practice problems on the BattleActs PowerPack wiki page, those should be roughly the same as what you'll get on the exam. You could also try looking at the CAS exam threads on reddit or post a question there yourself because lots of people now have done exams in the CBT format.

    To answer you question specifically, the data will already be entered into Excel so you would do your calculations either below or off to the side of the given data. Also, there is one worksheet per question, with a "table of contents" as the first sheet that shows point-values for all the questions.

    The CAS still hasn't released a sample exam so unfortunately I cannot answer whether the data sets will be larger or whether the questions will be different from what's been asked in the past.

    In any case, don't let that worry you too much. The material is all the same as the pre-CBT exams so if you know all the methods and are familiar with Excel (as virtually all actuaries are) then you'll be well prepared.

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