ARE Live: PjM Case Study

Want to learn how to tackle case studies on the ARE? Join us at our ARE Live broadcast on December 15, 2022 as we work through a Project Management case study.

We’ll go through 6-8 original questions from a set of project documents with our guest expert and longtime Black Spectacles collaborator Darion Ziegler. She’ll not only show you how to navigate case studies on the ARE, but also provide test-taking strategies.

Be sure to go through the mock exam ahead of time so you can review your answers live with Darion! PjM Case Study Mock Exam

Register here to join us live on Thursday, December 15, 2022 at noon CT.

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Our next episode will take place on January 19, 2023 and will be a PjM Case Study - be sure to register here!

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I’m really looking forward to joining this ARE Live! It should be a great discussion.

Register at the link above and check out the mock exam to see to the questions we will be reviewing during the live podcast ahead of time. :slightly_smiling_face:

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Welcome to the ARE Community, where we will be engaging exclusively during today’s ARE Live! Comment below with your PjM Case Study questions to have them answered during our Q&A session. Anyone who comments will be entered to win a free Black Spectacles t-shirt, so stay tuned until the end of the episode to see if you’ve won!

Looking forward to this.

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Just a reminder to post in the Community for your chance to win a free Black Spectacles t-shirt!

Thanks so much to everyone who joined! I had a blast, even if some of the math was pretty tricky :slight_smile:

I confirmed with Black Spectacles that I am allowed to plug that my firm is currently hiring! Check out our open positions at the link below:

Reztark reimburses employees for each ARE they take and pass. It’s a great place to be.

Hi Darion - Thanks for organizing the PJM event yesterday. Very helpful and useful. I wanted to do a follow up on some of the questions we workshopped together.

Question 7: According to the Clinger Cohen Act, this act allows the use of design-build contracting on federally funded projects. Why wouldn’t Design Build be one of the 2 answers? How is advisor instead of constructor a better answer?

Question 4: The DD fee already has the labor and the contingency to work from. If the DD fee + its contingency fee were already given to you in the work plan - why wouldn’t you just add two months in CD instead of going through all that math yesterday? nd will questions on the ARE be as time-consuming/difficult as this one? You took more than 10 minutes to answer this question

Thanks for your help

@coachchrishopstock and @coachdarionziegler

Hi @anna.ishii - While DB could be used on publicly funded projects (see AHPP, p. 703) it needs to be carefully one and combined with some sort of value-based selection process. I’d say that construction manager as advisor is a simpler solution and therefore is a better answer than design build for this question. We covered why CM-advisor is correct compared with CM-constructor during the broadcast.

For question 4, you can’t just apply 7% to the labor totals at the bottom because each billable rate needs to be considered individually and then rounded, per the instructions. I can’t comment on whether or not a question of this complexity would come up on the real exam, but I think it’s best to be prepared for one! While it did take 10 mins or so to go over on the ARE Live, part of that is because Darion is talking through the problem as she’s answering it, so that adds time to every question on our podcasts.

Awesome. Very helpful! Thank you so much!