Passed CIPP/US April 2021

[Ethan Han]

Hello all,

I took the CIPP/US exam today and passed.  My prep consisted of:

1. Reading the CIPP/US textbook from IAPP
2. Going through the Chapple course on LinkedIn
3. Reviewing the RSS outline that was posted a few months ago
4. Making flash cards based on the outline and drilling them multiple times, including the day of the test
5. Taking four practice exams in the last week leading up to the exam: (1) Weissman, (2) this group's practice question bank, (3) IAPP sample test, and (4) Jasper Jacobs

I may have overstudied but as a current full-time attorney, I didn't want to risk understudying and having to devote additional time/money to taking the exam a second time. 

I intentionally structured my studying in the above format so that I could take advantage of the growing body of knowledge I was learning over time.  As others can attest, the book and outlines are extremely helpful but they can be time-consuming to go through from start to finish.  For instance, It took me about a week to go through the book alone but by the day of the exam, I was able to go through all of my flash cards in about an hour because by that point, you're simply refreshing your knowledge rather than learning things for the first time.  This is not the only way to study, I can only speak to what worked for me.

Thank you to everyone for contributing to this group.  If anyone has any questions, I'd be happy to answer what I can.

[Angelica Lee]

I am thrilled to report that I followed this prep timeline to study for the July 2021 CIPP/US exam and passed earlier today! I could not have done it without the incredible resources in the shared Google Drive and forum posts like these. 

For an additional perspective, here are a few ways I tailored this study schedule to fit my study habits/timeline:

• I dedicated two months to study for this exam on a part-time basis (~14 hours/week) which may have been overkill but I didn't want to take any chances with such an expensive test
• I didn't do as well on the practice exams as I wanted to, so I ended up re-reading the entire textbook this past weekend to help refresh all the concepts I was struggling with (the textbook is your best friend, as tedious as it is to read)
• Because flashcards/Quizlet don't work well for me, I ended up watching the LinkedIn Chapple course over and over again until I could hear Chapple's voice in my head when answering test questions, haha. His course alone is not enough to pass, but it does get you pretty far. The morning of the exam I watched his course at 2x speed to get myself in the right headspace.

Thoughts about the test itself:

• Everyone told me that the test was going to be way more difficult than any of the practice exams offered online, but I would say the actual exam was only marginally more difficult. 
• I finished the entire exam in about 45 minutes, but I ended up turning it in around the 2-hour mark since 1) I went through each question again much more slowly to confirm the answers I was confident in and 2) I went through all of my flagged questions twice to see if I could confidently eliminate any answer choices. This may have not been the best strategy, but ultimately, it worked well for me.

I am happy to answer any questions people may have! :)