The Financial Adviser Standards and Ethics Authority (FASEA) has bowed to industry lobbying and has named key regional centres for forthcoming financial adviser exams.
The authority has also announced that the results of the inaugural exam, held in June, will be released in mid-August.
The new regional exam arrangements will mean that those sitting the exam in September will be able to do so on the Gold Coast, Cairns, Wollongong, Ballarat and Bunbury.
It said that based on demand, each location will have at least two sitting days with up to two sessions a day providing additional opportunities for advisers to sit the exam. Additional regional locations would be added for the December and February sittings.
FASEA also announced extended registration opening for the September, December and February exams with advisers invited to register for upcoming exams during the following periods:
- September 2019 exam (registrations open from 30 July until 30 August).
- December 2019 exam (registrations open from 30 July until 8 November).
- February 2020 exam (registrations open 2 December 2019).
It said eight metropolitan locations would be available for the September and December sittings (Sydney, Canberra, Brisbane, Melbourne, Adelaide, Darwin, Hobart and Perth) and that, based on demand, each would have up to five sitting days with up to two sessions a day providing approximately 70 opportunities for advisers to sit the exam in metropolitan locations.
Comments
If FASEA had a moral compass, they would release the results immediately and stop playing silly games with the pass mark. The press release states they are holding onto our results to complete a 'comprehensive marking approach and analysis'. I think that probably translates to 'carefully looking at the results so we can shift the pass mark to a number which makes us look good'. If too many to pass, it will look like the exam was too easy. If too many fail, they will soon be out of a job. FASEA have pretty much admitted this on their website where they say the pass mark will be anywhere from 65% to 74% 'as a starting point' and it will be adjusted for different exam periods. What a joke. This is not an exam. It is a competition. Financial Planners have been thrown into a real life Hunger Games event. Best of luck to all.
The range for a "credit" result is between 65-74%. So the minimum mark to pass the exam is 65%. FASEA have stated that they will not adjust marks to fit a bell curve, however there may be slight adjustments of less than 2% if one exam is found to be "harder" than a previous version (and likewise I imagine). My concern is what if you are on a borderline pass and it gets scaled down to a fail? You would never know as ACER nor FASEA will not release the exam results. The adviser won't even get told where they went wrong if they did fail. This is totally opposite to adult learning principles, however FASEA aren't exactly treating the industry like adults. I'm not defending FASEA in the least, just trying to make factual commentary. And yes it's a farce that they are taking 6-8 weeks to mark an exam where the university sector is able to do it in 4 weeks.
Less than 2% adjustment? I haven't seen or heard anything from FASEA in this regard. Please quote your source. Cheers
I didn't realise that, a pass mark with a range? Hmmm. I am certain they will mark down, they want to throw further shade on Financial planners and prove they are the tough cop on the beat. Hunger Games is an excellent analogy.
65% to 74%. Most accredited university exams would have this as a credit or distinction. I guess we are not doing a university quality exam.
no a distinction is generally above 75
At some uni's it is 75%. But a lot of Australian uni's have 70% as a distinction. eg. UTAS, melb uni, RMIT, uni of Adelaide, deakin uni, ANU plus many others. These universities also have 60% as a credit, which makes a mockery of FASEA's comment that 65-74% is a typical credit grade. My bigger concern is the fact that FASEA forgot to include the maximum marks for each question in the exam, which was a requirement in their own legislation. Will those who passed be forced to repeat? Will those who failed be able to legally challenge the validity of the exam?
How incompetent is FASEA if it takes two months to release results for a computer based exam.
FASEA would probably argue that part of the exam is short answer which cannot be marked by computer. However given that most of the exam is multiple choice, and the only feedback provided to applicants is a binary pass/fail, marking should stop for each applicant once they have sufficient marks to pass. Some people will get sufficient marks from the multiple choice alone. Others will only need 1-2 short answers to be marked in addition to their multiple choice.
There is no need to mark all questions for all applicants. It is a waste of time and money. Unfortunately FASEA doesn't care about such matters. They have hijacked well intentioned legislation to create an education sector gravy train.
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