Actuary Exam P/1 Preparation

MATH4010, Fall semester, 2015

Instructor: Yizao Wang
Email: yizao.wang@uc.edu
Office: 4302 French Hall
Office Hours: Mon 10:30-11:30am, 1-3pm, other time by appointment.
Class meeting: see Schedule below.

Course description

Preparation for Actuary Exam P/1. This is a one-credit course with passing/fail grade. Key knowledge points will be reviewed and problem-solving techniques will be demonstrated. However, to make sure to be able to pass the exam, students need to put in around 150-200 hours of study/practice for preparation.

Grades

Pass/Fail grade.

Preparation materials for SOA/CAS Exam P/1

• A/S/M Manual for Exam P/Exam 1 Probability, 16-th Edition, by Dr. Krzysztof Ostaszewski.
  Strongly recommended. A very popular and helpful preparation manual. The department has several copies for students to borrow. Contact Anita Swillinger for details.
• SOA/CAS Exam P/1 Sample Questions (Solutions).
• SOA Online Examp P/FM Sample.
• A Probability Course for the Actuaries by Marcel B. Finan.
  The latest version available at authors' website.
• Sample online actuarial exams are available from http://www.saab.org/actuarialmuorg.cgi
• Offical websites of SOA and CAS.
• Website of Be an actuary.
• Some general tips.

Lecture Format/Contents

The following list of knowledge points is taken from the 2015 Exam 1 Syllabus. I will go over them very quickly during the lectures. Student are expected to go through them in details by oneself.

The lectures will be mostly focusing on SOA/CAS Exam P/1 Sample Questions (Solutions). In the parenthesis of each knowledge point are the numbers of questions related in the Sample Questions. Students are expected to solve them all as a minimum preparation of the exam.

A selected number of questions will be discussed in the lectures, as indicated in Schedule below.

• Section 1 (1-28)
  Basic probability concepts (set functions, mutually exclusive events, addition and multiplication rules, independence of events) (1 - 5, 8 - 17)
  Conditional probability (6, 7, 24, 33, 38)
  Bayes Theorem (19-23, 25-28)
  Combinatorial probability (141)
  
  
• Section 2 (29-75)
  Random variables (32-34)
  Expected value and other distribution parameters (44-56, 60-67)
  Moment generating function (57, 58, 130, 137)
  Percentile, mode, skewness, kurtosis, standardized random variables (59, 68-70)
  Transformation of a random variable (36, 37, 40, 71-75)
  Frequently used distributions (29-31, 39, 41, 42, 43, 153)
  
  
• Section 3 (76-125)
  Joint probability functions and joint probability density functions (100, 110, 111, 118, 125)
  Joint cumulative distributions (77, 79, 88, 89)
  The Central Limit Theorem (80-87)
  Conditional cumulative distribution functions (111, 112, 119, 120, 123)
  Moments for joint, conditional, and marginal probability distributions (96, 100, 113, 114, 115, 116, 121, 124)
  Joint moment generating functions (95, 98)
  Variance and measures of dispersion for conditional and marginal probability distributions (see moments above)
  Covariance and correlation coefficients (99, 104-107)
  Transformations and order statistics (76, 91, 92, 94, 97, 103, 108, 109, 117, 122)
  Probabilities and moments for linear combinations of independent random variables (convolutions) (93, 101, 102)
  Commonly used multivariate distributions (90)
  
  Mixed distributions (135, 145, 148, 149) (not explicitly required in the syllabus 2015)
  

Schedule

• Week 1 (Aug 24 - 28): organizational meeting Tue 1-2pm, 4119 French Hall.
  
  
• Week 2 (Aug 31 - Sep 4): Mon 5-6pm, 4206 French Hall. We will begin with Section 1.
  
  Recommended problems: 7, 13, 19, 24, 141.
  
  
• Week 3 (Sep 7 - Sep 11): Thur (Sep 10) 1:30-2:30pm, 4119 French Hall. We will continue on combinatorial probability. Here is a worksheet (there are few problems from the sample questions).
  
  We will talk about problems 14 - 17 from the worksheet in class.
  
  
• Week 4 (Sep 14 - Sep 18): No meeting.
  
  
• Week 5 (Sep 21 - Sep 25): Mon 5 - 6pm, 4206 French Hall. We will start review materials in Section 2. We will first focus on frequently used distributions, and transformation of random variables.
  
  Recommended problems: 29-32, 34, 40, 71, 73.
  
  
• Week 6 (Sep 28 - Oct 2): Mon 5 - 6pm, 4206 French Hall. We will continue with Section 2.
  
  Recommended problems: 42, 43, 44, 46, 48, 50, 52, 57, 58, 60, 68.
  
  
• Week 7 (Oct 5 - Oct 9): Mon 5 - 6:30pm. We will finish Section 2 and start Section 3.
  
  Recommended problems: 53, 54, 77, 88, 100, 101, 102, 104, 105, 106, 107, 110, 111, 114, 115.
  
  
• Week 8 (Oct 12 - Oct 16): No class.
  
  
• Week 9 (Oct 19 - Oct 23): Mon 5 - 7pm, WCharlton 227. Meeting with Cincinnati Financial.
  
  
• Week 10 (Oct 26 - Oct 30): Mon 5 - 6:30pm. Keep working on problems before 125.
  
  
• Week 11 (Nov 2 - Nov 6): Mon 5 - 6:30pm. Review Sample Exam 8 (from study manual).


• Week 12 (Nov 9 - Nov 13): Mon 5 - 6:30pm and Thurs 1:30 - 3pm (4119 French Hall). We will work on the hard problems (after 125).


• Week 13 (Nov 16 - Nov 20): Mon No class.


• Week 14 (Nov 23 - Nov 27): Mon 5 - 6:30pm.


• Week 15 (Nov 30 - Dec 4): Mon No class.

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