8G (yes, 8G!)

[Phil]

How many pages is the syllabus for this one? Knowing this would help me plan my study time. Thanks!

-Phil

[Anonymous]

I just passed 8G. I think there are about 1,600 pages of reading. However, that includes tables and appendices of which some are background only. It's probably more like 1,400 or so if I had to guess. Good luck!

[Dixie Chick]

On a related note, would anyone be interested in buying typed notes for 8G??? I am considering packaging my notes up to sell because I worked really hard on them and I hate to see them go to waste - and it would be nice to make a little money too. Myself and a coworker who used my notes both passed 8G on the first try.

[Phil]

Oh, what the heck, I'll bite. Usually I find that my notes are in a very different style from anyone else's, and I can't understand other people's notes. Dixie Chick, would you do me a favor and email me a page or two excerpt of your notes on Group Insurance, Ch. 24? That's the only chapter I've read so far, and I could see how I like your notes. If I like them, I'll be happy to pay money for them.

My email is psugar@tiaa-cref.org.

Thanks! (I've also been thinking of selling my notes if and when I finally finish the syllabus.)

-Phil

[minnie SNOW dah]

Are there any study materials (comparable to JAM, How-to-Pass, etc) available for course 8x?
I haven't gotten there yet, but I'm just curious.

[Dixie Chick]

Phil, I just sent you an email with the notes you asked for.

[Not Mike]

Phil, are you going under the assumption that 8G will use the same syllabus as last year? Just curious, I'm probably going to take 8G, but I haven't thought to look at a syllabus yet....

[Phil]

Whether I'm right about the syllabus being the same as last year or not, I don't think I can pass 8G (or any other :cool: unless I start studying now. So my only hope is that I'm right about the chapters I choose to read. There's no way of knowing whether they will change the syllabus or not, but given that doing so is such hard work for them, I bet they won't bother.

Even if I'm wrong, I'm still learning stuff that in some way or shape will probably be on the syllabus. I recommend getting started on whichever course 8 you are taking soon. It may be possible to pass course 5 or 6 starting when the syllabus is finalized, but course 8 is harder.

Good luck to all candidates!

[Dixie Chick]

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[Dixie Chick]

Cheezhobbit,
I'll be glad to send you what I sent Phil tomorrow from work. I have about 160 pages of notes which covers everything on the syllabus except for 3 chapters from the last section on claims. My original goal was to type a "condensed outline" to memorize similar to the JAM outline. I wasn't hugely successful with that though because I had a really hard time deciding what was important enough to include versus not. I think the notes are still a good tool for memorizing though because they are much more condensed and organized than the Actex. And they give you somewhere to start. I started by trying to memorize all of the main points under each heading (the A's, B's and C's in the outline). Then I went back through and tried to memorize any of the details (1's, 2's, and 3's) that were "list" oriented and likely to show up on easy essay questions. By the time you read through the notes enough times to memorize the main points and lists, you've read through the other details enough times to at least remember some of them from general recall. Anyway, that was my strategy and it worked okay considering the amount of material.

As far as price goes, I haven't really decided. I was thinking about $100 because I think the notes are worth that much - especially compared to the Actex. However, I was going to try and get some feedback from this discussion forum. I would go as low as $50 if that's all that people would pay for them. I am assuming that most ER's cover the cost of study materials so $50 or $100 isn't unreasonable. If anyone has to pay for them out of their pocket then I would consider going even lower - the main thing is that I worked really hard on my notes and I hate to see them go to waste. Surely someone can benefit from them and if their ER will foot the bill then maybe I can make some pocket change!

[glenn]

If these are the same notes sent to me late last year, they seemed well written (expert opinion based upon a quick read from someone not familiar with the material).

And I'll make the same offer I make to everyone - I'm happy to facilitate distribution of anyone's study notes. Probably not 'officially' with something like this, but I'm happy to create PDF files from Word documents, put up sample chapters for you, whatever we need to do to make this stuff easily available.

[Dixie Chick]

Glenn, yes, they are one and the same. And I'll be getting in touch with you soon about the offer to create and post a PDF file. I am just about finished "touching up" my notes - it has been harder than I thought to get motivated enough to do it.

[jb]

Dixie Chick, have you considered offering your notes to Actex? I spoke with someone from there at an SOA meeting last June, complained about the 8G notes, and they did sound interested in having some help revising them. Unfortunately I STILL didn't pass 8G on my second attempt, so I really don't feel like I can help.

Also, just wanted to put in a plug for my two years running e-mail list on yahoo groups. I haven't passed but lots of others on the list did, both years. (Maybe I spend too much time administrating the list?) The advantage, I think, over this forum is that we do have the previous years' archives easily accessible.

If anyone taking 8G or 8M would like to join the list, you can e-mail me at joy.mcdonald@af-group.com. I don't anticipate much list traffic until at least July, but who knows. I'm sure there are a few people studying now.

Finally, I would recommend the Kongstvedt book as one to start on early. Since the new edition was on last year's exam, I doubt that much will change.

Joy

[jb]

I forgot to say, Dixie Chick, I would love to see your notes for one or more of the Kongstvedt chapters. I don't know if my company would pay for your notes or not, but it never hurts to ask, and it may be worthwhile for me to pay out of pocket for them. You can e-mail me at joy.mcdonald@af-group.com.

[RedDog]

Dixie Chick,

If these study notes really are that helpful, why don't you consider selling them to anyone interested for $50-$100 each? If you can put them into a .pdf file or something, there's no reason why they couldn't be distributed to more than one person.

[Dixie Chick]

Hi RedDog, I am currently working with Glenn (the webmaster) to sell my notes through Rapidact. Using the bookstore will allow students to use check or credit card and will produce a valid receipt to submit to employers. Right now we are thinking that the notes will be emailed as a Word document which will allow students to edit them to suit their needs. The notes should be available within a couple of weeks - I will post something here when they are ready.

[Anonymous]

Dixie Chick,
Can you also e-mail a copy of your sample notes? I am really interested in buying your notes since I didn't pass the exam last November and was overwhelmed by the extermely large materials.

Here is my e-mail,
littlemonkey6012@hotmail.com

Thanks.

[Phil]

I'd like to publicly compliment Dixie Chick on her notes - they're fantastic! I bought them (in fact, she was so sweet, she sent them to me in advance, even though she hasn't been paid yet) and they have literally doubled my reading speed. She has them in Word format, so there's less time typing my own notes, because I can simply modify hers to suit my needs. I strongly recommend them. Don't buy the stupid Actex. It's time Frank Reynolds's yearly pension of $200 per student dried up.

There's no reason why we shouldn't have a 100% passing rate on course 8G this year, thanks to Dixie Chick :smile:

-Phil

[Dixie Chick]

I swear I didn't pay him to say that!!! But I do appreciate it.

As an update, my notes are now available through the Rapidact bookstore. The website address is http://www.rapidact.com. You can look at a sample of the notes under the product description. The sample is a PDF file and it represents about 20 pages of the notes. The complete set of notes will be emailed to buyers as a Word document which will allow you to edit/organize them as you wish.

[Axsuetarian]

what about for those of us that have to pay out of our own pockets? How much should we have to pay?

[Axsuetarian]

what about for those of us that have to pay out of our own pockets? How much should we have to pay?

[RedDog]

Dixie Chick,

Do you recommend reading all of the textbooks still? Or do you think it would be more efficient to just read your study notes many times and memorize them as well as possible? I found that the 2nd time I took Course 5 and Course 6, my time was much more efficiently spent just reading and memorizing JAM and ignoring the textbooks/study notes. Generally I don't get much from reading the textbooks/study notes, and I'm kind of a slow reader anyway so it seems like a waste of time.

[RedDog]

I will probably take 8M instead of 8G. Do you still think Dixie Chick's notes would be better for me than buying the 8M Actex? I know that the core material for 8M and 8G is the same. Do Dixie Chick's notes go beyond the core material for 8G?

[Dixie Chick]

Reddog, my opinion is that you need to read through the Course 8 texts/study notes at least once. Some of the topics are complicated enough that you really need to do the reading to understand the "theme" or the main idea behind the topic and then use the notes to remind you of the high points. The flip side is that I wouldn't get too bogged down in the reading. For example, the CAST study note and the Credibility study notes go on and on forever but I think that there are only a few main points to be learned from each. I tried to only put those points in the notes. I think that the Credibility chapter is one I included in the sample file that you can download from the Rapidact website.

As far as 8G versus 8M, the notes cover the entire 8G syllabus, core and specialty. Since the core material overlaps and is probably 70-75% of the material (someone correct me here if I'm wrong - that's a guess), the notes may still be useful to you.

[josie]

I took 8M and I would say that you would probably be missing around 40% of the material. Much of 8M is the Managed Healthcare Handbook. (In my opinion, the book from hell!) 8M has a lot of chapters from this book and each chapter contains a lot of material. That being said, if I had to take 8M again, I would probably still buy these notes because there really aren't any good notes out there for 8M. At least it makes around 60% of the test easier to study for.

[RedDog]

Josie,
Did you purchase the Actex 8M? That's the only specific 8M study guide I've found. If you did, what did you think of it? I guess I'm kind of debating between the Actex 8M and Dixie Chick's notes.

[RedDog]

Is anyone under the impression that there is more material on 8M than 8G? In looking at the extension for both, there seems to be a lot more material for the 8M extension than the 8G extension.

[josie]

I did purchase the Actex. It wasn't great, but it gave me at least a basis for my notes. If money was not a concern, I would probably purchase both. If money was a concern, it would be a tough call. Maybe Dixie Chick can put the chapters together that apply to both 8M and 8G (i.e., leave out the 8G extension) and sell it at a reduced price. (Just a suggestion.)

As far as 8G vs. 8M, I only looked at the 8M extension so I can't really give a fair comparison. I only know that most of the extension for 8M is from that Managed Care Handbook. In my opinion, the Managed Care Handbook seemed to have much more information per page compared to the other books.

But, if you are trying to decide which extension to take, stick to the one that you have the most experience with (it definitely helps).


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<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: josie on 2002-02-14 11:16 ]</font>

[RedDog]

I tried to have my Admin team buy Dixie Chicks's study guide for me, but apparently they didn't do it correctly. Now I hear that Rapidact was bought out by "the actuarial bookstore", and I don't see her study guide on "the actuarial bookstore" site. What happened to it?

[Dixie Chick]

I am working with the Actuarial Bookstore to continue marketing the 8G Study Notes. I will post a message as soon as they are available through the Actuarial Bookstore. I do not anticipate this to take very long (maybe a week or so?) so check back here in a few days.

Thanks!

[Not Mike]

Dixie, do your notes cover the entire syllabus? I'm trying to decide how I want to approach the exam.... I kind of want to "make my own" notes, but I know what an excrutiatingly long process it is....

Would you say that your notes are comparable in style to the JAM Condensed Outlines where there aren't many details or more comparable to the Detailed Outline or maybe somewhere in between?

Thanks for any help...

[Dixie Chick]

Hi Not Mike.

The notes do cover the entire 2001 syllabus. I point out the "2001" part because I do not plan on updating the notes for any syllabus changes. I don't expect there to be significant changes and if there are any, the notes are in MS Word format so they can easily be updated as you study.

My original goal was to create a JAM-like condensed outline. It ended up being a lot more difficult than what I expected. I was very nervous to leave out things - especially since I was typing my notes about 3 months out from the exam - I didn't want to risk forgetting anything important. I think that I ended up with something in between. Definitely not as detailed as the Actex, but not as condensed as the JAM condensed outline.

I think you can use the notes though to take a similar approach as the JAM condensed outline for memorizing. Last year, I started out memorizing by looking at the main points (main headings, capital letters, and numbers). When it came to memorizing, I pretty much ignored the smaller details (usually small letters a) b) and c) ) and simply read them as I went through memorizing the bigger details/topics. There were a few exceptions to this rule but for the most part it work. This will make more sense if you look at the sample download on this website. I think the sample has 20 pages or so of the actual notes so you can see what I'm talking about.

Also, since the notes are in MS Word, you could always go through and delete the things you didn't want to memorize, in effect making two versions of the notes, one with the details and one without.

[Not Mike]

Dixie,

Thanks for the info... I viewed a portion of your sample way back when, but I wasn't motivated enough to pull out the books and see how detailed it was... let us know when it's carried by the bookstore...

[Dixie Chick]

The notes are now available at the Actuarial Bookstore website.

[yunr]

Hi Dixie Chick,

Is your book titled "Study Notes 8G"? Is your last name Bern?

Thanks

[glenn]

Here's the link. They're titled 'Study Notes 8G'.

https://www.actuarialbookstore.com/mall/NewProductPage.asp?sku=8S-14&fmcategory=S8HGLM&fname=

You can view a sample download from the homepage of this site (in the downloads section).

[gtopak]

Did any of you folks take the Review Seminar offered by Frank Reynolds? Is it worth the time and money?