FSWE Dissected

Took the test this am and met a few Yahoo FSWE group members, Zach (aka York) and his wife (I don't know her online ID, so I'll refrain from naming names (Go Wildcats!). It was such a pleasure to meet other likeminded people in person and gossip about other people in the group! ;)

Everyone seemed mostly relaxed, with a few overconfident; we only numbered in the mid-teens, but were supposed to have had almost 30 show up. The instructions required the proctor to announce when ten minutes remained, but our proctor graciusly offered to further write on the board when 30 minutes remained. Very, very thoughtful of her, allowing for better pacing.

The Bio section seemed to be the toughest for me, not so much the lack of experience, but rather the repetitive listing of examples. Not to mention some, uh, terminology I've never heard of, and can't say whether it's applicable or made up. The breakaway republic did come in handy, thank you. ;)

Thanks to everyone in the essay group I felt quite confident and pleased with my result, despite the rocky start. Our proctor told us to read the prompts and not start writing until she told us to begin, although she never did. Most of us didn't realize that the clock had been started for almost 5 minutes. I did get a lot of mental organization done though. I ended up rewriting half of my intro and was much more pleased with the finished product, but it did look a mess. Now if only they can get to read it. ;)

The cone specific section was great. I finished early and took some time to scan through the other sections. Whew! Some of you ought to get bonus language points at the FSOA for understanding some of those monsters! Every section did seem to have their fair share of computer/tech questions, though.

English expression: confident, but we'll wait and see.

Final Analysis: Although I cannot say definitively whether I passed or failed. Regardless of the final outcome, I was still satisfied with my performance on this first installment.