Written Exam Guide
Everything for a passing score on the written exam can be found in the Official BJCP Study Guide, which is freely available on the BJCP website. However, parroting the Guidelines or Study Guide can be easily detected by the exam graders. It is important to study multiple sources in order to achieve a higher score on the Written Exam.
Overall Tips/Tricks
- Write neatly! If a grader cannot read your handwriting, or reads it incorrectly, you may not get the points you would otherwise be allocated.
- When possible, use grids to answer the question. This makes it easier for you to write and easier for the graders to grade.
Format
The Written Exam consists of two sections:
- BJCP ethics, levels and judging process
- Essays
Ethics, levels, judging process
The ethics, levels, and judging process are considered remedial questions. Anyone attempting to advance to National should already know these. Getting these questions incorrect will count against the essay portion of the score, up to 10% of your total grade. There is no excuse for missing these questions.
These questions can be found on pages 18-24 of the BJCP Study Guide.
Essay Portion
There will be 5 essay questions. Each essay is worth 20% of the overall grade. Two of the essay questions will be the style question. The format of this question is on pages 24-27 of the BJCP Study Guide. The remaining three questions will be technical questions. All of these questions can be found on pages 28-30 of the BJCP Study Guide.
So, you have the questions prior to sitting for the exam and you have the means of finding the answers beforehand. Assuming you know the answers to the questions, what makes this exam so difficult? Many examinees do the following:
- Don't answer the question fully
- Don't have clear, concise answers
- Don't demonstrate independent thought and simply parrot the Study Guide
- Spend too much time on portions worth less
- Aren't able to finish the exam in 90 minutes
What can you do to push the odds in your favor?
- Practice your exam answers. Write them out and time yourself. You have approximately 18 minutes per essay question. Practice writing until you achieve that.
- Don't waste time where it's not needed.
- e.g. Don't spend 12 minutes writing out your recipe and stats for the recipe question. 70% of the points are in the technique and adherence to guidelines!
- Study from multiple sources.
- Ask an exam grader to look at your practice answers for tips.
- If you are in the position to (i.e. currently National), volunteer to grade exams!
A look at each question: