I'm one week and one day away from taking the new and revised CSE. (yikes - any other brave souls with me on that?)
3-17 St. Patty's day test! Luck of the Irish, even though I'm not Irish!
I've been studying for many months (casually) using TWE (including an initial seminar last year in the Fall), passxflash, and more recently, Woo's exams.
My current test scores on OMCES are mid-90's, and I've taken them twice. I did not take the exams until I had listened to the whole enchilada 5 times in complete. (It was only then that I felt the information had sunk in enough for me to even consider testing - and I started that about three weeks ago.) I have since listened to a few troublesome sections again just to be sure of my knowledge. My current evaluation of TWE is that is it great for getting to know the overall scope of the concepts on the exam. BUT - I felt that I still needed to read the CAB test plan again and go over certain sources on my own. As far as a broad look at what you might need to know, it's helpful for getting some of the confusing aspects straight in your head.
One thing I have realized from reading this forum in the last week or so is that I needed to brush up a bit more on Calgreen, The Practice Act, and perhaps the Energy Code...
I have read the practice act in full earlier this week, slowly and thoroughly.
I am currently halfway through the process of reading Calgreen's 2016 Guide and taking notes on the primary concepts so that I can read it once or twice more before the exam. I'm already LEED accredited so this isn't a hard thing for me to tackle during my final push. It seems fairly straightforward.
I can say that with one week left, I am feeling good about my chances for passing this test. I know it's going to be hard, but I have tried to make sure that at every step of the way that my knowledge of the material is deep enough that I can apply the concepts in some way. For a long time I was feeling like I didn't really understand some of the inter-relationships of the agencies but after so many repetitions I finally got them to sink in.
I also find that using mnemonic devices to help me remember things that I get wrong more than once is a good thing too - making a mental picture of the idea and the resolution so that I don't make that mistake again.
So, with one week left I am going to:
Take the (all-category) OMCES exams (which I have not done yet - I've taken each sub category test twice)
Finish reading Calgreen and perusing the Energy Code.
Take Woo Exams one more time (just for fun). ha!
Read the A201 summary one last time and review the other AIA docs briefly. (yes I know about B102 and B201... I feel comfortable with those)
It sounds like a lot but I am completely focused on this for this week so I think I can handle all that. Here goes nuttin...