Discussion:Yipee! I passed EA Exam - Part 1

During the exam I was sure I was going to have to repeat it. But at the end it said "Congratulations!"

It was a hodge-podge of easy, moderate and obscure-cryptic questions. There were a few questions where you had to know the tax numbers for a given limit. A few questions required some reasoning! But most required good memory. And just about all required careful parsing. There were many times where I wanted to argue with the question preparer: not enough information - given how contradictory the tax code is. But I just focused on giving what I thought was the best answer.

I've read through Whittenburg's book on Federal Taxation (introductory) and selected parts of SouthWest books (Individual, Business, and Entities). I also took their on-line quizzes for Individual. Of course, Pub 17 is heavily worn.

I used WiseGuides: software questions, manuals and flash cards. I carefully went through them all. For me the questions were valuable - they forced me to parse them carefully. For example, the difference between 'may' and 'must'. There were many times where'd hit the wrong answer - because I misread the question. The WG software let me access the questions by topic (where one can plow through them all) or by test simulation. Both are useful.

I also in the last week got PhoenixTaxGroup questions. Most of the questions were nearly the same and in some cases identical to the WiseGuides. (I realize some were examples from IRS docs.) Some questions covered new ground or from a different angle - so I had a few aha's. On the plus side, the Phoenix questions were 'crisper' in many cases and less repetitious.

On the downside: I could not access all the 475 Phoenix questions, because they are only available randomly in the 100 question format. What's wrong with that - you may ask? As I came to realize, each time I took the test - I would get previous questions repeated with just a few new ones. This bugged me, so I created a spreadsheet to see if I was imagining things.

The probability of getting a new question = 100 * (1 - (AlreadyAsked / 475))

I only had time (or patience) to go through 6 rounds. From the table below, we see that there were still 115 questions that I'd not been asked. I would take a mind numbing 25 rounds to get to see every question at least once.

Now onto to Part 2! I'm pumped.

Well, my wife wants me to do a few chores around the place, which she claims is going to H!

===========

     Test____New Quest____Asked____Unasked

1________100________100________375

2________79________179________296

3________62________241________234

4________49________290________185

5________39________329________146

6________31________360________115

7________24________384________91

8________19________403________72

9________15________418________57

10________12________430________45

11________9________440________35

12________7________447________28

        13________6________453________22

        14________5________458________17

        15________4________461________14

        16________3________464________11

        17________2________466________9

        18________2________468________7

        19________1________470________5

        20________1________471________4

        21 ________1________472________3

        22________1________472________3

        23________1________473________2

        24________0________473________2

        25________0________474________1

I had a very similar test as yours, there were several questions where I was thinking....there is simply not enough information to answer this question. I was right, of course. So I eliminated the obviously wrong answers and took a guess from what was left. If I assumed X, the answer was A. If I assumed Y, the answer was B.

I just passed Individual as well and have part III on July 21 (if I don't rechedule for earlier).

Michael

I took Part 1 first back in October 2008. My heart was POUNDING before going to take the test and then when I clicked that I was done with the test. Of course, then they throw that survey at you...so the anxiety raises AGAIN when you click done with the survey. Luckily I passed.

I must say---the person that motivated me the most to get my EA on this site is Kevinh5....so thank you! I have one more test to take on August 1..and then I will hopefully be an EA.

I used the prior years SEE exams that were published on the IRS website and red the publications, not just pub 17. A lot of the questions needed more information in order to pick a correct answer or there was no correct answer so that made it hard to learn. I spent so much time preparing for the exam it almost cost me my marriage. Thankfully now he appreciates what I did. I was fortunate that I had a co-worker who was very generous with his time and assistance in helping me to understand why the answer was what it was. I knew of no forums such as this that I could consult at the time. I may not contribute much but I have learned a lot from everyone here, as you will all come to realize.

I recently passed part 1 and I am taking parts 2 and 3 at the end of July.

I am using Phoenix too- I am not using the self test software until right at the end. Instead I am keeping track of which questions I have completed in the book and I am aiming to go through the book questions three times. Once I have done that I will go to the software in the few days before the exam.

Good luck with the rest of your studies!

Pete

I'm sure glad I did not have to endure all three exams at once. This way I'm able to focus on one field of knowledge at a time.

My hats off to the folks who passed the once-a-year-only paper tests. That was truly an ordeal!

Kevin, I was planning to join NAEA when I'm certified. They give newbie EA's a discount first year.

I'm also planning attending the NYC IRS conference in August.

Good luck to all who are about to die (Ooops, I mean) take the next part.

I was kind of dreading Part II, thinking that I might even have to take it twice to pass it. After all of the posts about how bad it was, I was concerned. Can the failure rate really be that low compared to Part I?

I have Part III scheduled for July 21 but I may move it up. I am ready for it now.

I had planned to devote August and September to studying for part II and take the test in early October.

Michael

Only those specializing in business returns would choose to start by taking part 2.