How to Create a Study Plan for CPA Canada CFE

As you’re gearing up for your CFE exam in the CPA Canada’s education program, it’s important to plan what you’re going to study and when, so that you’re on track and efficiently prepared. This article will help you create a study plan that’s both flexible and focused, helping you cover the necessary material without feeling overwhelmed.

Step 1: Choose the CFE

As a first step, you’ll need to pick which CFE offering you’ll be writing. Currently, CFEs are offered in May and September. Taking into account your work schedule, personal commitments, finances, and study pace preferences, decide which offering suits you best. I recommend the May CFE exam for most students who are allowed by their employer to take time off in spring.

Step 2: Figure out your learner profile

A “learner profile” is the category of CFE writer based on your program status. You can be:

  • First-time writer
  • Internationally trained accountant (MRA/MOU)
  • Experienced writer – Day 1 only
  • Experienced writer – Days 2/3 only
  • Experienced writer – Days 1/2/3

First-time writers, and others, who are taking Capstone 2 will receive a Capstone 2 Calendar. This is a good starting point to build you study plan as it shows the 8-week module with case submission deadlines and study activities.

Step 3: Write out your inputs

To build an effective study plan, we need to know how much time you have available. Think of all your commitments and write it out in a document. Be specific, don’t write “personal errands”, write the specific item, what day(s) of the week you do it, and the time commitment. For example:

  • Work
  • Commute
  • Exercise
  • Health activities (eg dentist appointment)
  • Walk the dog
  • Cooking
  • Family dinner
  • Toastmasters meetup
  • Take kids to daycare

These are going to help you determine how much study time you have and how to balance you professional, personal, and educational commitments. If you find that your list is lengthy and there is not much time left for studies, I suggest outsourcing some the tasks to family members and others living with you (eg roommates). For example, you can delegate walking the dog and cooking so that you’re not responsible for it during the study period and free up more study time.

Step 4: Sort out your study leave

If you’re like most CFE writers, you will have weekends and weekday evenings available for studies as you’re likely working full time. These alone aren’t enough to effectively prepare you for the CFE, so you’ll need to ask your manager for additional time off or “study leave“. Nearly every student writing the CFE gets some type of study leave, be it paid time off, use of vacation time, or unpaid time off. In public practice, the large firms give 8 weeks time off to their staff, which is one of the reasons I recommend writing the CFE in May as opposed to September. The average time off requested by CFE writers is 3-8 weeks from my experience, so you should try to get something in this range.

You may end up with as much as 5 or 6 weeks, or as little as 2 or 3 weeks. The more time you have, the better. As of the date of writing this article, we have 50+ past CFE exam cases available; it’ll take you really long time to cover them all. If you didn’t get at least 3 weeks off, negotiate with your manager for additional time. For example, you can offer to complete key projects ahead of the leave period or work overtime when you return to catch up on tasks.

If you don’t win the negotiation, it’s no a reason to quit your job. While time is the most valuable resource in the preparation for the CFE, the utilization of your time is more important. For example, you may get 8 weeks study leave, but if you don’t start deep studying until 2-3 off before the exam, than you may as well had 3 weeks off.  

Step 5: Allocate resources

The bread and butter of studying for CFE is practicing cases and debriefing. Past exam cases are going to be the main inputs in your study plan. While Capstone 2 provides cases for practice, these are only the recent CFEs so I recommend adding more cases in your plan. I suggest practicing cases from older to newer. You can start from year 2018 CFE and work your way up to the most recent ones. You’ll learn most technicals from debriefing, as long as you do it properly, but I also recommend adding a few technical review days to your plan.

Once you start mapping out the cases (see the next step below), you may discover you’ll be out of time and won’t get the chance to write the most recent CFE exam. In that case, drop the oldest case and start the plan from the next oldest CFE. For example, remove 2018 and start the plan from 2019 to see if everything fits. Note that Capstone 2 doesn’t provide the most recent CFE cases/solutions and these not released until a year late, you can consider getting the solutions I’ve written as a substitute.

If you hired a tutor, coaching program, or partnered with a study buddy, these will be additional resources that will be added to the study plan. For example, you should add the time it takes to attend tutoring sessions, watch case walkthrough videos, and attend calls with your study group or study partner.

Step 6: Map the study weeks

The next step is mapping out the inputs and resources. Choose a platform, such as Excel, Word, Google Sheets,Google Docs, etc. and add a calendar template. For example, you can download free Word / Excel calendar templates from this website.

Begin by mapping out which cases you plan to write each week leading up to the exam. If you’re taking Capstone 2, make sure to use the Capstone 2 Calendar in conjunction so that it’s aligned with your deadlines. I recommend coding the cases based on the CFE year, for example: “Day 2 2018”, “Day 2 2019”, “Day 3 2023 May”, “Day 1 Version 1”. Have a listing of cases in another tab or document, similar to below, so that you can keep track of your progress:

I also suggest allocating Day 2 cases for the weekends and Day 3 cases, plus technical review, for weekdays. You won’t be able to accomplish much during the week as you’ll be tired from work so allocate no more than 1-2 Day 3 cases from Monday – Friday until you get to full-time study leave.

For the full-time study leave, allocate more cases and less technical review. It will be all about practicing cases, debriefing, having your cases marked (by Capstone 2 or your tutor) and debriefing again.

Step 7: Be flexible

Life happens. Keep flexibility in your study plan for unpredictable events in your life. I suggest adding “Flex days” every other week to catch up on errands and any materials that require extra time to review. This approach ensures that you can adapt to unforeseen circumstances without compromising your overall preparation strategy.

To give you a guideline, a Day 2 practice and debrief will typically take a day and a half. Same for Day 1, it’s about the same length (Day 1 4 hours, Day 2 5 hours), so allocate day and a half for Day 2 and Day 1 case practices. A single Day 3 case will take a few hours to write and debrief, depending on its length, so allocate 1/2 or 1/4 of a day.

Conclusion

The goal of the study plan is to give you a roadmap to successfully navigate the preparation process and to help you stay on track. It’s important to set realistic goals and manage your personal life. I’ve seen many students fail the CFE because something personal happened and they missed several days and weeks of studies. Be sure to speak with your household members and set the right expectations with them so that you’re on track to pass the CFE. This clear communication ensures that everyone understands the importance of your CPA designation, reducing disruptions and supporting your journey to success.

Extra resources

Extra CFE resources are available at CFE Review course.