BetaLog

作者:zyqin http://www.betalog.cn

在过去的两个多星期，我收到了许多朋友的关于CISA考试的来信，有询问信息的，有寻求指导的、小技巧的等等。尽管我已经很努力的回复邮件，但是邮件太多了，我无法一一回复。

Dear All

During the course of these more than 2 weeks i received a lot of individual requests seeking information, guidance, tips, etc. for CISA exams. Though initally i tried to respond them individually but then due to volume it became a bit difficult. So here is a detailed response from me based on whatever little i know and experienced about it. I have tried to reproduce below some of those requests and i am specifically answering them in the To field above and I am also copying it to the relevant professional forums so that those whom i could not include and those who might be interested in knowing more about it also get this information.

First i would advise all of you to please be a member of two excellent study groups focussed on CISA from which i got immense help. Daily in my emails i would get valuable content, important terms' definitions, questions for practice and very useful discussions on various possible answers and why the correct answer is best among all other options. Apart from basic stuff like CISA Review Manual and practice questions databanks and softwares these 2 forums are the best available free resource for CISA anywhere in the world in my knowledge. Many people dedicated their time to help thousands of students like me around the world and here i would specifically mention Parthiv Mehta, Siddarath Gupta, Salman Tarik, Atma Ram, Adhi, and many others who regularly post content like questions, suggestions, discussions that keep you involved and motivated on a day to day basis......I have also attached a word file containing some of the very relevant recent discussions that you would find very useful in knowing the ansers about how to approach these exams, how to prepare, what care and caution should be taken, tips, strategy, advice and possible reasons for those who could not pass, etc. etc. Infact you can find everything relating to CISA here.....and the links for both these groups are:

http://tech. groups.yahoo. com/group/ CISA-Study

http://tech. groups.yahoo. com/group/ CISAforum

and after joining them please besides seeing their current posted messages also see their valuable message archive from which you can find virtually every answer on CISA.....i would advise you to pleas make a separate folder for CISA study related emails from these groups in your email accounts and file all useful and relevant content there ...it would also help you alot...i currently have around more than 350 such emails in my folder!

Second, i would like to say that regarding such basic question as to eligibility, exam sch., fee, enrollment deadlines, way of enrollment via website, exam format, scoring methodology, course content, recommended study material, etc. here is the main page on CISA certification from ISACA website containing all relevant info. and details that you may need 

http://www.isaca. org/Template. cfm?Section= CISA_Certificati on&Template=/TaggedPag e/TaggedPageDisp lay.cfm&TPLID=16&ContentID=4526

I would nevertheless say the following:

1) Eligibility requirement to appear is bachelors or equivalent including the fact that CA Inters and Module D passed from ICAP as well as ACCA qualified are eligible.

2) Plz note that you can save around US$30 for registering before Early Registration deadline which for coming Dec-2008 exam session usu. falls on 15th or 17th August 2008 and same way for June 2009 exam session would fall in mid Feb-2009. Final registration dealine for exam session of Dec-2008 would fall between 30th Sep-2008 to 10th Oct-2008 and for June 2009 session during 31st March 2009 to 10th April 2009. Further, yiou can save around US$30 still further if you register online via the website using credit card which is recommended highly.

3) Plz note that no other qualification whatsoever whether CA, CPA, ACCA, MBA, CMA, etc. entitles you to any waiver or exemption of any kind for CISA examination. No matter who you are you have to appear for the examination and after qualifying the exam you must meet the strict mandatory relevant experience requirement to be certified and being eligible to use the CISA designation with your name....a fact that auses heartburn to a lot of people who do not realize its implications before venturing into it! So plz note that qualifying the examination is one thing and getting certified is altogether another.

And lastly, keep everything aside and focus only on CISA Review Manual (CRM) from ISACA itself and related practice questions bank from cd both for current year and last few years....while you can focus on CRM of only current year (i.e. of 2008....even 2007 CRM would do...i and many others just prepared from it and made it without ever seeing a single page of CRM 2008!) for practice of questions practice as many questions as you can from cyrrent as well as from prior years and also from the above 2 groups advised for this purpose..... I wish all sincere CISA aspirants good luck and also advise all that plz first evaluate and assess if you really want to or need to do it before taking the plunge! And a sincere preparation effort of a few months atleast should yield positive results..... ..

I would write in detail later about other relevant things for CISA in coming parts....

Cheers!

Imran