This article will provide suggestions for taking the NICET exam.  It is a good idea to get a good night’s rest the night before your test.  If you must drive a long distance to test, I suggest getting a hotel room and spending the night before.  Even if you have friends or relatives that live in the same city as the test, my suggestion is to get a hotel room where you can be alone.  Staying with friends or relatives the night before may work for some people, but for others, it could lend itself to staying up late visiting and be counterproductive to resting.

You should make sure you are up in time to eat breakfast the day of the exam.  I suggest arriving at the testing center at least 30 minutes prior to your testing time.  This will allow you to find the testing room, get signed in, and relax for a few minutes before beginning.  The proctor will pass out answer sheets, scratch paper for working math problems, and an envelope containing your exam.  There is to be no talking during the exam.  The proctor will step the entire group through filling out the various forms, then will tell you when to officially begin testing.

When you begin taking your exam, you will notice that after each question, a time is shown in parenthesis by the question.  This tells you how much time is allotted for answering the question.  This time is calculated into the amount of time you will have to take your test.  My suggestion is to not focus on the time, but to just be aware of it and to know if you are going over the time limit for a question.  You will find that some questions that have allotted 2 minutes may take you 5 minutes.  Other questions that have allotted 5 minutes may take you 30 seconds.  So again, be aware of the time, but do not get caught up in it.  The questions should be your main focus. 

If you’ve prepared for the exam by marking your code books and other reference materials with sticky notes, and if you’ve studied the material, then you will now be realizing the rewards from such preparation.

A score of 60 or better is considered as a passing score for each element.  A time-saving suggestion is that if you are certain that you have correctly answered 60 percent of the questions for an element, either skip the other questions pertaining to that element or quickly read the questions and choose the first answer that looks right.  The idea is to advance to the next element as quickly as possible once you are certain you’ve passed the prior element.  For example, if an element has 5 questions and you are certain you’ve answered the first 3 correctly, answer the last 2 quickly or skip them altogether.  Be aware, though, that if a question is not answered, it will be counted wrong.

Another suggestion is that if you get hung up on a question or a few questions in an element and spend more time on them than you should, move on to the next element.  Earmark the difficult question or questions and come back to them once you’ve finished the rest of the exam.  You don’t want a question or a series of questions costing you precious time that could be used to correctly answer questions to elements later in the exam. 

If you test for a high number of elements, you will take a mandatory lunch break.  At this break, your exam, and answer sheet must stay in the room.  You are not to discuss the test with others who are also testing.  Obviously the proctor(s) can’t be everywhere at lunch and may not know if the test has been discussed, but this is considered to be on the honor system.  NICET has high standards for ethical behavior and it is expected that each participant (and certificants) will uphold these standards.

Lastly, the proctor will tell you when you have 2 minutes of examination time remaining.  This is commonly referred to as the “two-minute warning.”  In the event that you receive your two-minute warning and you have several questions remaining, my suggestion is to quickly read each question, then just as quickly choose the best looking answer available.  This isn’t the ideal way to test, but as mentioned earlier in this article, unanswered questions are counted wrong.  The thought is that if you jot down an answer, at least you’ve given yourself a chance to get it right.

Upon completion of your test, you will seal your answer sheet in a tamper-proof envelope while the proctor watches.  This is to ensure that no tampering with the answer sheet has taken place once you’ve completed testing. 

I hope you’ve found this series to be informative.  Good luck to you in your preparation and testing.