STEP Prep Thread 2016 (Mark. II)

x=+-1 and tan theta is -1/y i think.

Estimate of grade boundaries: 99 / 70 / 60 (for S / 1 / 2).

Please note that I am in the minority who think the paper was generally OK, but some of that is me underestimating the difficulty of Q6 (I think this is OK as I overestimated the difficulty of Q3), and because Q12-13 were both on the easy side (but not many try the stats).

If others agree with you then I'm probably wrong; the way I was thinking of it was I imagined there were only n-1 cards, considered the probability that all were wrongly ordered and then put in the last card in one of n spaces including the ends... now that I think about it though, I don't think that would multiply the probability by n. Ah well, I'll just have to aim for an S in 3 by doing all the mechanics questions...

Any idea how many marks that last bit was worth?

If somebody could put my mind to rest as to whether I got a 2 or a 1, I'd be eternally grateful:

nah thats definitely a 1. Even without q1 I think you'd get high 70s.

How come? I'm pegging myself at low 70's even with 70's.

How come? I'm pegging myself at low 70's even with Q1.

If somebody could put my mind to rest as to whether I got a 2 or a 1, I'd be eternally grateful:

Being honest if you found a paper tough - it was a tough paper. I'd bet anything that you've done much better that 2 fulls and 4 partials in STEP II papers plenty of times before, so you should be expecting lower grade boundaries no? Did you find it considerably harder that usual ones?

That was one rough STEP 2 exam - here's what happened to me:

Q1- Decided to start here but couldnt see the point (i.e couldnt interpret the 90 degree thing and kept staring at the question for a while) and so just wrote down tangents using general points (p^2,p^3) and (q^2,q^3) and then realised that p=-1/q and finally got the equation. Then found the graphs touch at x=0.5 (is this correct?) and drew graphs (hopefully fine). But the time penalty caused in the beginning haunted me through the whole exam.

<br>Q7- Did the intro, (i) and (ii) but got stuck midway in (iii) when I got to a step where i had to integrate an expression very similar to (iv) but with x=u/2 (is this supposed to happen?) and so couldnt do (iv) either but wrote down a substitution for (iv). The time penalty from before was still in action so I had to leave the Q at this point.




Q6- This wasnt very nice towards the end. Did (i) and (ii) and found y2n thing in (iii) but couldnt do the show that in (iii) correctly after attempting to differentiate z(x). In (iv) I just differentiated v(x) and tried creating a differential equation but failed.

Q9- Did (i) correctly but got nowhere really in (ii). I dont know whether my methods were correct in (ii) or whether there were errors in that as well. I just tried to use momentum once and tried doing something for b and c after that (attempted to use a relative acceleration but idk whether thats correct) but I didnt get too far.

Q4 - Did the first part (hopefully correctly) and the show that in (ii) I think I tried to find x and tan(theta) after that but failed and left the Q.

Q11- With a bare 20 min left I took this up hoping to do at least (i) but I got lucky and managed to do both (i) and (ii) except for the final explanation which I didnt get (and at which point I had just 2 min or so left which wasnt helping my brain) so i guess this Q can be called an almost full maybe?

Anyways what do u guys think I'll get ?

well i mean, could you let me know how many marks u were thinking of for each question? Id be good to see if Ive been too generous/stingy etc. in places

Did I get a 1 with this?

Certainly.

I cut myself 11 marks in Q1 for doing the cubic wrong, not showing the graphs intersect and not showing the locus. i.e: only 9 marks for writing down the tangents to the curves, equating them and solving for x and y, and writing down a cubic and getting the shapes of the graph right.

Then cut myself 2 marks in Q3 for a dubious justification of the even n case.

Gave myself 9 marks in Q4 for what I've listed, given that I did the y^2 + 1 > 4(y-1)^2 bit wrong and didn't try finding x or tan theta.

12 marks in Q6 for doing the first three parts and not the last (iv) part.

17 marks in Q7 for doing pretty much all of it but slipped at the end of the last integral.

9 marks in Q8 for the measly attempt I have.

Wow it seems like we both have a problem with exam conditions, I also underperformed, got only 1 full solution (integration in less than 20 mins lol) and then did as much of 5 others as I could. Luckily I got an almost full in Q3 (or whatever the one with the almost e^x series was) at the end.
Pretty sure I got a 1 but not an S.
Seems unfair that you're not getting S's in these though with how good you are .
Hopefully STEP III goes well.