Whats the craic with this? I did it & passed but it doesnt give you a score out of 200. Only a list of things questions I didnt pass on...
User Name: Thomas Delaney
Course Name: BJCP Entrance Exam
Course ID: BJCP
Exam Name: BJCP Entrance Exam
Attempt: 1
You scored below passing in the following categories:
Beer Styles - Multiple Answer
BJCP Program
Brown and Scottish Ales - True/False
Dark Ale Comparison - True/False
English and American Ales - Multiple Choice
Hybrid, Wheat and Belgian - Multiple Choice
Lagers - Multiple Choice
Porter and Stout - True/False
Processes and Ingredients - Multiple Choice
Style Comparison - Multiple Choice
Technical Brewing Questions - Multiple Answer
Whats the craic? Is there an actual pass score or what?
Did they email you a certificate? Was that all that was up on the screen? I forget what came up when I sat it!
I'd say try logging in again and seeing if it says passed/failed next to the exam...
They don't give you a score - it's either pass or fail. The passing score is secret to the BJCP, but it's probably around 60%. The list of "below passing" sets of questions is like when your school report said "must try harder in these areas".
But you've passed! ;D Roll on February!
What needs to be done before sitting the online exam?
Yeah I got emailed a cert. I just found it weird that you don't get your score.
Sorry I misread earlier, they are very secretive about passing grades etc for the online exam! Congrats on passing! I assume you'll be giving the tasting exam a go in February?
@cathal - I'd say a good knowledge of the styles and the bjcp study guide would see you through it. I hope to go through some bits over the next couple of course days to make it easier for ye all to pass!
Id written off doing bjcp this year as I couldnt commit to that many trips to Dublin. Seeing as there are extra slots now though I might aswell give it a lash. Ive not done any of the tasting sessions like ye have. What exactly happens at these? (can i do them myself at home?) Where do I get the literature about the actual bjcp judge rules & guidelines? (there were a lot of those questions in the online test that I just took a guess at)
Thanks.
Quote from: Hop Bomb on October 03, 2013, 08:26:34 AM
Ive not done any of the tasting sessions like ye have. What exactly happens at these? (can i do them myself at home?) Where do I get the literature about the actual bjcp judge rules & guidelines? (there were a lot of those questions in the online test that I just took a guess at)
So far at the tasting sessions the main focus has been on tasting the beers and filling in scoresheets. I did a small introduction on tasting beer on the first night and Will did a lecture on water, I dropped the planned series on the various topics due to them being just a bit heavy for our needs.
The two main documents you require when Studying for the BJCP (All Levels) are the Style Guidelines and the Study Guide. For the Tasting exam you really only need to study the style guidelines. The Study guide is good for the online exam as well but mainly for the written exam. (It is in here you'll find the info on the bjcp's rules and procedures)
The written exam can only be taken if you have achieved a high enough score in the tasting exam. So we hope to have a few members sitting this in late 2014 or early 2015.
From a tasting at home point of view, the beers have all been sourced locally, there is a list of appropriate beers at the bottom of each style guideline.
Study Guide: http://www.bjcp.org/docs/BJCP_Study_Guide.pdf (http://www.bjcp.org/docs/BJCP_Study_Guide.pdf)
Style Guidelines: http://www.bjcp.org/stylecenter.php (http://www.bjcp.org/stylecenter.php)
I will put up an article on the front page over the coming weeks with some better info, but if you learn those two documents you'll be in good shape for the entrance exam and the tasting exam.
Quote from: Cathal O D on October 02, 2013, 10:25:44 PM
What needs to be done before sitting the online exam?
And for that, see this thread
http://www.nationalhomebrewclub.com/forum/index.php/topic,1519.msg45540.html#msg45540
Thanks Padraic. Will ye defo be running a siebel day for members before the tasting exam?
We hope to, probably one for the people and a second one for anyone else interested! Might do a third if we get the numbers!
did my online this morning and passed
loving it
was nervous at the end as it was processing my result lol!
Well done Matthew! It's always a nervous few seconds awaiting a result on online exams!
See you on Saturday, or possibly Friday...
I just came across this on another forum:
QuoteI was involved in setting up the question pool (hence my curiosity on how it's being received). There are ~6000 true/false and multiple choice questions in the question pool. I don't see how a "cheat sheet" can be made that will be effective for this kind of test.
6,000 questions sounds like a lot alright!
Just did it there now and passed. Being a brewer is a massive advantage for the exam for the technical questions.
There were a lot of repeated questions too.
Quote from: shiny on October 13, 2013, 07:24:16 PM
Just did it there now and passed. Being a brewer is a massive advantage for the exam for the technical questions.
There were a lot of repeated questions too.
Congrats! I was thinking that similar questions were asked alright a couple of times!
Well done Shiny. Some judges were looking for a link to the BJCP free exam -
https://secure.coursewebs.com/bjcp/Default.aspx
scroll down to near the bottom of the page.
Its definitely very doable. I didn't read over anything before attempting it and despite getting plenty incorrect and guessing others, I still passed.
Quote from: shiny on October 14, 2013, 01:29:47 PM
Its definitely very doable. I didn't read over anything before attempting it and despite getting plenty incorrect and guessing others, I still passed.
I hate to be the bearer of bad news but...
QuoteEveryone passes this exam, but had this been the actual BJCP Entrance Exam, you would immediately be informed of your pass/fail status.
:P
Whoops, meant the full exam there... :D
just passed it now. did get a good few similar questions, 2 were identical except for one word.
gave it a shot without any prep on shiny's recommendation ;D
Quote from: beerfly on November 03, 2013, 12:53:53 AM
just passed it now. did get a good few similar questions, 2 were identical except for one word.
gave it a shot without any prep on shiny's recommendation ;D
Great stuff! Well Done Ronan!
16/20 (80%) on the freeby test.
Shouldn't have got the one about Lambics wrong, seeing as I'm reading about them now. D'oh!
I passed the 20 questions, but not the 200. :(
Whoop whoop........crack open the beer....I've just passed the online full exam.......phew :)
Congrats Kellie!
I must study and work up the nerve again.. :-X
Question re. the online exam:
Is it purely on the style guide or are there other questions like "BJCP exam protocol Questions" or questions about Ingredients and other Tech questions?
The later two are defo. in the "Study Guide" and form part of the writtten exam.
its weighted towards the style questions but there are also ones on the BJCP organisation and brewing techniques/ingredients
As beerfly says, but it's difficult to know which documents to study as they all have stupid names.
Just sat the exam. Sorry to say FAIL:
Must do better in:
Category
Beer Characteristics - Multiple Choice
Beer Characteristics - True/False
Beer Styles - Multiple Answer
BJCP Program
Brown and Dark Ales - Multiple Choice
Brown and Scottish Ales - True/False
Dark Ale Comparison - True/False
English and American Ales - Multiple Choice
Hybrid, Wheat and Belgian - Multiple Choice
Pale Ale Comparison - True/False
Porter and Stout - True/False
Technical Brewing Questions - Multiple Answer
Will, as previously debated it tricky to pass and not necessarily related to knowledge. Its time management we found the toughest. Really have to rattle through. We discovered having sat it a few times:
fly through them and answer the ones you are sure about that way you get the ones u defo can get right.
next idea to consider are the multiple choice multiple answer that can take ages to figure out and little chance of being sure you chose any or all the correct ones so they are the q's that I think u lose the most points on so I'd suggest answer all the ones you know instantly and when you have that done repeat the other ones where you have to spend a few moments to make the right decision.
having reviewed our experiences we also discovered that there many questions that are commonsense and almost seem too easy like is a judge allowed wear aftershaave...well clearly its a no but there are others that having reflected were just as obvious but we doughted ourselves
as for 'open book', u dont really have any time to use open book but your tables we found very useful and learned a lot from them.
so I feel if doing it again I'd include the approach above that way you defo get all the ones you know and score there and the more time consuming questions dont have time wasted on them till later.
All that said we dont know how they mark your paper maybe theres more points for the MCMA and less for the true / false.
Also theres a few questions on BJCP judging guiddes and comp day rules; we found many of the answers are in tables contained within this section of the BJCP exam guide.
hope this helps
Hard luck Will, I feel your pain.
@bren; Yes thanks for the tips!
Yep time management is the order of the day. I marked about 5 for later and got to 199 before the timer ran out.
A one minute net drop-out didn't help either!
I am trying again on Wednesday on a fater net connection!
I will answer in this order:
1. True/False and single M/C that you know.
2. MC/MA that you are very confident on
2. Go back over cat 1. then cat 2.
Did you or any one else get questions about the BJCP_3_2 program (or something like that?) The phrase was new to me! (and I don't mean the 3 exams for 20 bucks option)
@Bren: More questions:
Did you "mark" the answers you were leaving till later or did you just keep scrolling back and forth.
When you come to number 200 can you "next" onto question 1 or what!
I marked marked about 25-30 that I hadnt a clue about and where the question itself was headwrecking like " is it likely that it could be unlikely that a judge may not perceive diacetyl That wasnt an actual question but an example of a format where u need mental skills like Grammatical reasoning, spatial search, paired associates and odd one out-deciphering cognitive skills... These are the ones that most definatly decline with age and alcohol. :)
My idea was that if there was time ( which was debatable) I would then use the open book technique or laptop with the bjcp guide open.
I thought I got about half that I was confident were right and probably 50 I gave my best shot and prob 25 I just had to guess and hope for 50-50 success
Having reached question 200 you click summary and the questions You did not answer and / or marked for later will appear in colour. just go to the earliest one and you can procede page by page again from there. option 2 is click summary again and choose which one u want to answer.
********BIG TIP*******
when u dont know an answer, mark it for later and move swiftly on...REALLY IMPORTANT... having first had a guess...coz if u run out of time and havnt even taken a guess u defo get no score. If u take a guess while marking for later at least if u dont get enough time to go back to them you have some chance of getting a score ( i dont believe u lose points for wrong answers????)
@ Wulld.. Dont recall a 3 for 2... but Im not sure.. If so I would have made a guess at that one coz I havnt a clue wat it means....and yes I would prob think its something to do with the exam fee unless of course we all studies the 70 pages of rules in glorious detail as Im sure if its asked its prob in there somewhere
Thanks Bren for all of the advice, I would agree with most of the points you have made! Best of luck to those still working on this!!
Quote from: Will_D on January 27, 2014, 03:25:48 PM
Did you or any one else get questions about the BJCP_3_2 program (or something like that?) The phrase was new to me! (and I don't mean the 3 exams for 20 bucks option)
I think that's a refernce that is pulling in the 3/2 offer's name by mistake. A question got Gordon Strong I guess.
Passed the online exam.
Is there a thread for registering for the tasting exam ??
I cant make it and I want to free up my space.
Woo Hoo!!
2nd time lucky oops: Read More hard revision
Passed: :)
Need to do better in:
Beer Styles - Multiple Answer
Belgian Ales - True/False
Brown and Dark Ales - Multiple Choice
Dark Ale Comparison - True/False
Lagers - Multiple Choice
Pale Ale Comparison - True/False
Technical Brewing Questions - Multiple Answer ::)
Well here's to some tasting experience on Saturdasy !
@Tube: Do we need to physically bring the certs to the exam (as it says!)
Cool we r gettin there :)
I failed again even though I thought I did OK.
It didn't help that the session to the exam server dropped about half-way so I lost a few minutes.
My Internet is solid and other websites popped up straight away.
Unwillingly, I'm going to do the 3 for 2.
Depending on how I fare this week, I may not be up for the tasting exam in Dublin.
Be warned, I am on the cusp of being very anti-BJCP.
...or fail harder.
Have we a list officially started:Gripes with BJCP?...
hard luck john.
did u read the tips we sent to willD?
we have commented extensively, the exam is not just about knowledge its about practical things like speed of your pc and internet connection. of course there are issues and we are getting a chance to highlight. We ( me and Kellie reckoned it took over 2 seconds to change a page on our crappy excuse for broadband ( our laptops are reasonably good) and we found it particularly slow to review the questions which didnt help. It seems when you have 10 mins left you cant go page by page through the pages with unanswered questions and therefore you have to scroll 50 pages to get to maybe 5 pages with unanswered questions so my point here is the 2-3 seconds to forward to the next page when we only have 18 seconds to anseer per question is a big disadvantage to those usoing 2 gazillion gigiwhatever BB in dublin on a quad core pc. Or maybe its the BJCP SERVERS??? Is everyone a few seconds to change to next question set?
What do you find most unfair / frustrating John?
looks like we could all be made redundant in a few years anyway ;D
http://www.thejournal.ie/beer-tasting-robot-1292507-Jan2014/
Firstly: I am not a beer Expert, or a beer snob.
1. There is no structure to the exam.
The questions are all over the place.
If it was the leaving cert, all the Theorems would be together.
Jumping from a style question to one on OG range to a trick double-negative (Verbal reasoning) is bollocks.
2. There is no indication if there is negative marking. (That I have seen)
3. One question was about the temperature appropriate to a Single Infusion.
In my mind there was no correct answer, as the temp I would aim for was not there.
The answers were in the form xxF (yyC).
The (closest) answer was in the form xxF (yyF), note the F in brackets.
So this is a trick question then?
4. There is no room for trick or inaccurate questions in this exam where there is such limited time. Questions should be presented fairly.
5. There is too much scope for gang-banging the exam, using rent-a-crowd to brute force it is possible, and rubbishes the exam.
I'd agree with you john on pretty much all those points.
In an earlier post or two I have also highlighted most of these. Particularly the tricky questions which are difficult to dechipher ( I actually gave an example to highlight the type of issue (" Jumping from a style question to one on OG range to a trick double-negative (Verbal reasoning)" and yes it involves many forms of reasoning that some people have and some havnt and we all lose this ability with age so definate ageism at play as well ( and I dont mean BJCP are deliberatly anti age) there is a large advantage to a 2o year old versus a 60 or 70 year old without a dought and not just on reasoning but practical handling of the computer based tasks.
Hopefully some good will come of our comments on it
6. Why are we expected to know all about Grand Masters?
I'm sorry but the table of %ages are completely irrelevant to the Apprentice Judge.
To get a licence for an Articulated Truck you start by driving a car.
7. Given the difficulties that some of us have encountered, I am of the opinion that this obstacle entrance exam standard is high enough that the BJCP are excluding some potentially excellent judges from participating and evolving organically which in my opinion would make it a better and more wholesome organisation.
8. Shouldn't this be fun?
Quote from: brenmurph on January 31, 2014, 04:08:38 PM
there is a large advantage to a 2o year old versus a 60 or 70 year old
We'll see... I haven't tried it yet!
I totally agree with your comments john. Some of the questions are a bit off the wall.
But it is what it is.
Quote from: johnrm on January 31, 2014, 05:16:01 PM
8. Shouldn't this be fun?
It should be and it will be.
Sent from my GT-I9300 using Tapatalk
Quote from: Cathal O D on January 31, 2014, 05:37:17 PM
But it is what it is.
Absolutely, understood.
I appreciate that its not a walk in the park.
"Son, my Father, my Fathers Father, and my Fathers Fathers Father all fell down the same Hoooolllle..."
Sometimes change is good.
I heard we were allowed input.
I've paid in, so I'm having my say.
Quote from: Tom on January 31, 2014, 05:17:33 PM
Quote from: brenmurph on January 31, 2014, 04:08:38 PM
there is a large advantage to a 2o year old versus a 60 or 70 year old
We'll see... I haven't tried it yet!
1 participant in a study dosnt count Tom ;D
Mental agility/ performance (Reasoning, planning, concentration and memory) These are all embedded into the fast paced exam; This is my main constructive criticism of the exam.
All above componants of brain function decline with age hence my statement and therefore the age related advantage in the general population. Add to that the comments previously made.
In reality a paper exam would work far better and would eliminate many of the issues and at the end of the day education is about learning outcomes not fast memories and photographic memory. Indeed as someone just mentioned when this happens great potential people get left behind.
The whole European Qualifications Framework is based on competencies and learning outcomes not old fashioned pressurised tests which sadly still exist albeit slowley changing.
Everything you need to know about my Cognitive comments are contained in glorious detail here, including very good referencing.
http://www.cambridgebrainsciences.com/
+1 bren.
'Learning by rote' isn't that what they call it.
To hell with that.
Dear Andrew Moore,
Congratulations, you have passed BJCP Entrance Exam.
Attached is the certificate for this exam.
Certificate Information
Name: Certificate of Completion
No. 1709 ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D
I must have been confident- I only paid for the single exam rather than the 3 for 2. Off for a congratulatory beer. I think the limited edition Samichlaus is in order.
Congrats Andrew!
Are you doing the exam on Saturday?
I am now. To tell you the truth I was kinda bricking it before I approached the exam after I read this thread.
To give any advice on the exam, I would say spend as little time as possible on the multiple answer questions. I found I could be certain on 2 or 3 of the possible answers and then get stuck on one of the others because I wasn't 100% sure if it was correct or not. These are the question which I think take up most of your time.
Being a home brewer is definitely a plus but as I haven't graduated to full grain yet, there was still a lot for me to learn before taking it. On the plus side all the BJCP admin/methodology questions are pretty obvious, and I think that might have swung it for me in the end. That and the off-flavours where probably my strengths.
And just to add- after taking the exam, there's a lot of areas I think the BJCP can tighten up on, re the Study Aid and Style Guidelines.
I agree with the comments in general from John and Bren, but the reason for this test is because it saves them time in having humans marking the exam. If it was a written exam they would need a skilled person to read your thoughts and decide whether your points are relevant or not. The exam was brought in to make the process a bit more streamlined...
I agree that the BJCP's methods are not perfect but they are still the best show in town for home brew beer judging. And only (imho) beaten by Certified Cicerone's in beer tasting at the moment.
And John, the fun bit was tasting all the beers at the start, it's all down hill from here!!
Best of luck in getting through it, there is a lot of luck involved. I found that relaxing is the best way to approach it but that's easier said than done!