How to PASS a Professional paper you have failed on next reseat.

Below is how to PASS a paper you have failed on next reseat? My five important advice points. ??????????????

It happens to the best of us. You study for 3 to 4 months on end, take your CPA exam, curiously wait for ICPAU’s Exam release and only to discover that you didn't pass that paper. You may have felt disappointed, frustrated, anxious, or all the above.

But after the emotional roller coaster subsides, it's important to remember that there's always a silver lining. Use this experience to positively reinforce where you went wrong and what your next plan of action is to get back on the horse. Now this is my take on what you should do when you fail a paper.

1. The first step is to of course analyze why you failed. Ensure you do a personal evaluation of the process you went through to the exam. Ask yourself some questions. -Did you stick to your study schedule? After each study session, did you meet your study goal? Did you evaluate what you got out of it? Where could you improve and what were you confident about? Are you legitimately studying? Did you not have enough time? Were you unable to prioritize your exam over other things going on in your life? Did you attend all the lectures and do the practice for past paper questions? Did you have discussion group? etc. Whatever the question and answer on your side, try to do something different.

2. After a personal evaluation. Talk to a friend who passed the paper with a good score say 65 and above, ask them what they think they did special to pass the paper. I believe their experience may also greatly help you. You can pick a few ideas of the things that they might have done but you didn’t do your own side. See what ideas you can pick and implement them as you purse to do the paper in the next sitting.

3. Talk to your tutor. As tutors, we have taught some of these papers for long and understand some of the examiners interest. Interact with the tutor on how you found the exam and ask them those specific questions that you think might have led to your failing. I trust your tutor will give you some ideas that you can also take home and work on. If you don’t trust your tutor or they aren’t that friendly, you can reach out to us at Achievers Professional Trainers.

4. If you can find the examiner’s report for that on the ICPAU website, well and good but if not, get the paper you did and sit down to go through the examination questions one by one and make sure you do comprehensive research on the topics that challenged. One it will give you some ideas on the knowledge gaps you had on the topics that were examined but also those questions have a chance of reappearing in the next sitting. It pains a lot to go to the exam and find a similar question in previous sitting that you failed and the question challenges you again.

5. Another important advice is that unless you failed the paper because you were sick, didn’t have a calculator or something similar out of you control and not an issue with your knowledge gap, it is advisable to go back and attend classes of this paper. It is important to go back and understand the concepts again and those that you could have missed in the previous sitting. I usually advise students that it is also better to re-attend a class with a different tutor so as to get a different approach. Re-attending with the same tutor may demoralize you compared if you are attending with a different tutor. Don’t say you will attend only revision… this time isn’t enough for you and may not give you a good preparation unless you have challenge of finances.

6. Incase above all circumstances you cannot re attend your classes, it is good for you to create a reading plan using the syllabus that can hold you accountable and commit yourself to follow it every week say twice. Find a serious discussion group with students attending classes, exhaust all past paper questions and reach out to a fellow student or a private tutor that can help you where you have challenges, get good notes like the ICPAU study kits and make sure you do research for all the topics on the syllabus.

Above all to pass a paper that you have failed in the past sitting is pick up your sell and totally prioritize studying, period. Make sure you give this paper enough time just like the other papers that you will be sitting for the first time.

If you want to pass the exam, it's important to dedicate some hours of intensive study time to put the above suggestions into practice and improve your score. If it means deleting some distractive phone apps and turn off all phone notifications, do it and Inform all friends and family that you will be completely unavailable during your blocks of study time.

I believe that you have potential to pass to that paper come this November 2019 Sittings.

Samuel Ibanda.

CPA Tutor at Achievers Professional Trainers.