Customer Reviews

Barron's Officer Candidate School Test

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(10)
1 star:		(10)

 

 

It's a useful book, I'll give him that. It's also one of only two on the market that seemed very applicable to someone about to take the Navy Officer Aptitude Rating Exam. I don't have massive time to study. I work 8-15hr days. I work about every third weekend, and sometimes 3-4 weekends in a row. I work out 2-4 times/day. I'm trying to make the All-Navy Triathlon Team. I have two degrees.

Which is why when I do sit down and study something written by a 23-year veteran of the military, about something that he should be intimately familiar with, it disturbs me that there are so many mistakes.

I scored 3 wrong answers on one of the math tests. Mr. Rod Powers had at least 7 wrong answers, and he had the benefit OF WRITING THE TEST, with presumably a few math books open right next to him. Did no-one proof-read this or go through all the tests to make sure the answers matched the questions?

In some instances, he even had the right answer to the question listed in an explanation, but the answer key was wrong. Once he even has two explanations, one wrong and one right. Some answers are COMPLETELY unrelated to the question asked.

Some of the basic math he teaches is just BLATANTLY WRONG, not that I remember much from AP Math back fifteen years ago, but I'm pretty sure his stuff about square roots is just not right.

Holy crap, pal. If this is the best you can do, then the US Air Force was wrong to keep you around for 23 years. Good game job security working for the government, huh?

I would agree with the guy who previously reviewed this. I am in the process of studying for the AFOQT and while taking the math practice exercises I have found three errors in the first 41 questions. What gives? Someone should have checked these before going to print.

Under the Mathmatics Knowledge practice exercises, there are errors on #28, #34, and #41. And I am not even all the way through yet.

Out of all the prep material purchased, I found this item to be the most useful and beneficial. Not only is it the most current and up to date afoqt book around, but MANY of the questions mirror the actual questions that will be found on the test. I was able to breeze through many sections due to the challenge this book put forth. Yes, there are a FEW errors, but I found that to be true to some extent in all my purchases. Do yourself a favor and buy this book.

This book has too many errors to be considered a study guide. If you are studying this book for the math portion, then please buy another book. I stopped counting the number of errors that I found. Many of the math formulas are incorrect, not to mention the number of wrong answers I discovered. I was very upset after having to go through all the trouble I did to find the book just to find that it wasn't helpful at all. There are not many OCS study guides out there, and for the good that this one will do you, you might as well look for something else. Not worth the time or money!

Mr. Powers,

I've used your [...] often over the years as I have made my way towards becoming an Officer in military. As I am currently persuing both a career in the Army and the Navy I have scheduled to take the ASTB (I have already taken the ASVAB and scored 97/99). Since I was unfamiliar with the ASTB I decided to get one of these study manuals to become familiar with the types of questions asked.

I was surprised to see that you had written such a manual and enthusiastically purchased it. Unfortunately I am distraught over how many errors there are in the book. I noticed them the most on the math tests for the ASTB and the Spatial Reasoning tests, which needless to say have driven me to my wits end. Such errors as 8 x 5 = 48 were present. As well as in the spatial reasoning portion the aircraft were blacked out making them near impossible to orient or the possible answers did not at all match up with the question.

Next time you author a book such as this, or even to repair your reputation now, I'd suggest taking the book to a local University for proofreading by experts. It would probably not cost you very much. A small donation to their respective departments would likely suffice.

I give this book a solid ZERO and suggest that no one buy it.

BARRON'S OFFICER CANDIDATE SCHOOL TEST:

This is great for letting readers know the basics of being a pilot in the military. Describes types of planes, pay rates, and job descriptions.

In terms of preparing the reader for a test, the book does well to let readers know the format of the test in order to take the test in a time-efficient manner. This is hugely important because tests are highly geared towards measuring one's ability to work quickly and accurately.

However, the book is NOT good in its written grammar and accuracy of answers. I spotted a couple (2 to be exact) answers that were objectively wrong. I confirmed this with others with whom I took the AFOQT. Another example is, I believe, on the first page of the book the word "between" is used incorrectly (instead of correctly using "among").

Overall, the book DID help me. However, I was a little surprised at the lack of an editor.

This book is good to use in conjunction with other books to prepare for the AFOQT test. HOWEVER, there are quite a few wrong answers in the Mathematics practice and testing portions. Plan on correcting their work.

For me, the point was to refresh my memory with the various subject matter. Spotting the errors became obvious after double checking my work.

This is a great reference book to prepare for any military officer test. Granted it has a few typo's but is loaded with lots of useful information.

There aren't a whole lot of options if you are looking for officer candidate test study guides, in particular, the Navy's ASTB. The one by Peterson's was a better choice than this one. The author has wrong answer and/or wrong explanations littered throughout this book. It really makes you uneasy studying because if you are truly lost and have to depend on this book, you will end up learning some procedures incorrectly or just dumbfounded at how he got some of his answers. I got this as my second book, after I went through the Peterson's guide, and while it gave a better description of the answers than Peterson's, the number of wrong answers are just unforgivable...don't buy it unless you are just brushing up or have another guide. Bottom line, check out the OCS Test book by Petersons.

I ordered this book about a year ago. I was excited when it finally came in because I was looking at going back into the military as an officer. Unfortunately, there are SEVERAL typos in the book. Most of them are in the math section...the section I needed the most help in. Some of the answers are wrong, and also some of the questions are wrong.

For more info on this test book, check out this link:

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