Completed my AREs (4.0)

[gbalaka]

Not bragging or anything......., but I wanted to thank all of you who participated in this forum and the founders of this forum for creating such an awesome place to share the stress of taking these painstaking exams. I didn't even know about this place until my third exam. Ever since then, I've been a frequent visitor.

I took my first exam on December 18th of 2014 and my last one on March 30, 2017. I failed my third exam once (SPD)....retook it, passed it and kept on passing all the rest of them until Schematic Design 2 weeks ago. Looking back, I can't even say which was the "hardest" - they're all hard. Schematic Design was the most "fun" one.

No point in posting my study strategy....you know...I studied....a lot. One thing i'll say is that it was of great benefit to me to read from multiple sources (AREExamPrep, Kaplan, Balalst)....over and over and over again. I did lots of google searches, YouTube videos...you name it. I never signed up for those Amber videos though......if my office had paid for it, I wouldn't have minded.

I'm not quite done though - I already started studying for the California Supplemental Exam, so i guess i'll be graduating from this portion of the forum and will be frequenting the CSE section.

I wish the best of luck to all of you with the rest of these exams (especially the new kids with the ARE 5.0 exams - I know nothing about those).
As long as you are a motivated individual, you will succeed in this - I promise.

Feel free to send me a message if you have any questions and i'll be glad to answer.

[standard]

Congrats! It's a huge accomplishment. There's nothing particularly difficult about the CSE. I felt that the CSE was actually a little easier to study for because the source material is more focused rather than broad like the AREs.

[gbalaka]

Congrats! It's a huge accomplishment. There's nothing particularly difficult about the CSE. I felt that the CSE was actually a little easier to study for because the source material is more focused rather than broad like the AREs.

That's great to hear.....i'm on knowledge statement 12 and I feel like it's a handful already. lol

So far, it feels very much like CDS and PPP put together. Lots of contract information.

[aylo12]

Congrats on passing. Could you share your study strategy? I have failed SPD twice and completely perplexed as to what I'm doing wrong. I passed PPP and SD on the first attempt and have the rest to test. Especially with PPP, I was surprised and shocked that I passed on the first try. My study materials: Kaplan, Ballast, Jenny notes, Dorf videos, AHPP, etc. I pass all of the practice exams in Ballast and Kaplan but when it comes to testing, I failed the MC twice and passed the vignettes. I spend very little time studying for the vignettes. Maybe one or two nights at most. And each time I've walked away, after taking SPD, I felt everything in the test was nothing to do with what I had studied. I'm completely at a loss. Would love to hear your perspective or anyone else that can way in. Thanks in advance.

[gbalaka]

Congrats on passing. Could you share your study strategy? I have failed SPD twice and completely perplexed as to what I'm doing wrong. I passed PPP and SD on the first attempt and have the rest to test. Especially with PPP, I was surprised and shocked that I passed on the first try. My study materials: Kaplan, Ballast, Jenny notes, Dorf videos, AHPP, etc. I pass all of the practice exams in Ballast and Kaplan but when it comes to testing, I failed the MC twice and passed the vignettes. I spend very little time studying for the vignettes. Maybe one or two nights at most. And each time I've walked away, after taking SPD, I felt everything in the test was nothing to do with what I had studied. I'm completely at a loss. Would love to hear your perspective or anyone else that can way in. Thanks in advance.

Hey aylo12, I know exactly how you feel.

I only used the study guides from ArchitectExamPrep for my first two exams (CDS and PPP in that order) and I somehow passed both of those exams. I did however read all of the AIA contract documents and so on and so forth.

I used the same study guide source for the SPD one and failed the MC portion. (i'm like you when it comes to the vignettes - never a problem). I walked out of that SPD exam with a giant question mark over my head as the exam covered nothing I had studied - lots of WTF questions. At that point, I started looking at Ballast (just the applicable chapters) and I realized there was a ton more information out there - Ballast is WAY too detailed but i realized there was a lot I did not know. I also read some of Building Construction Illustrated that I had from college. Not only did I read the Ballast stuff, but I also did a LOT of google image searches, watched YouTube videos, you name it - anything I could get my hands on (that was available on the web for free). I wanted to know what everything looked like. I remember I had some questions on the exam that would show a photo and say "what is this?".

I'm the kind of person that always takes my study guide with me everywhere I go. I study at work (i'm literally studying for the CSE at work right now), at home after work, on the weekends....I take practice exams over and over and over again until I memorize things. I would also recommend you do the practice exams on DesignerHacks. I found those to be very useful. It became like a game to me and i would try to get 100% on the exams (which i did). I used that website for every single exam after that. I think it's $30 per exam. I also did the practice exams from Kapan (i read very little of that one at the time).

Now, it's good that you passed PPP and SD, however the big three are CDS, PPP and SPD - they have a LOT of overlapping information. I would say that before you re-take SPD for the third time, you should take CDS as there's quite a bit of CDS on the SPD exam.

After i take the practice exams on the first try, i make a binder and i start writing down all the stuff i got wrong. And trust me, i get lots of stuff wrong. It may be key terms...whatever. I just write stuff down as in bullet points page after page after page. This becomes my study guide and i retake the practice exams again and do much much better. And i STILL get stuff wrong....then i highlight those items in my binder....then retake the exam again. Again and again and again until i know it all. This way, i walk into the exam very confident. And always expect WTF questions - no matter how much you study, you'll always get those. Just do your best and make sure you answer the question (and mark it). Then at the end of the exam, just go back through all the marked questions and see if you like your answer.

I don't belong to any study groups. There's no-one else in my office taking these exams - just me - so i guess you can say i'm self disciplined, but i try to study a little bit every single day. In my mind, i'll suffer now and relax later. Plus my wife is very supportive. We don't have kids yet, so there's no distraction there.

Last but not least, i NEVER sign up for an exam first and then start studying. I take as long as it takes to read the study material and only schedule an exam once i go through the first round of practice exams. There's no rush you know...you got 5 years to do this. No need to rush it. I think i spent like 5 months on Structural Systems in total.

Don't stress....take a break from SPD and start looking at CDS - read all the contracts from top to bottom. Also, you've taken the exam twice, so you should be looking up some of the random questions you got on the exam in case they come up again.

I hope this helps.

[Kiedys.Zdam.]

Congratulations!! We all studied a lot.

[aylo12]

Gbalaka,
Thank you so much for taking the time to respond to my inquiry. I appreciate your suggestions. You have many good points and I will definitely take them into consideration and utilize some of the strategies in my studying. Good luck with the CSE!

[gbalaka]

Gbalaka,
Thank you so much for taking the time to respond to my inquiry. I appreciate your suggestions. You have many good points and I will definitely take them into consideration and utilize some of the strategies in my studying. Good luck with the CSE!

No problem aylo12, best of luck to you as well.

One more thing...i use www.studyblue.com and I make my own digital flashcards on there. You can make as many as you want and it's free. (you only pay if you want to look at other people's flashcards).