MS Access 2013

Exam 77-424

Specific Information about the exam 77-424 information can be found on:
Exam 77-424 Access 2013

The MS Office Exams are administered by Certiport. For details, please refer to:
Certiport MOS Certification

My exam Experience & Preparation

I recently took and passed the Access exam 77-424. In this post I will share my experience on preparing for and taking the Access 2013 exam. The MS Office 2013 certification exams are all project based – contrary to the 2010 and prior versions in which you need to answer a series of unrelated questions.

One downside to this new format is that you should not reset your work; where in the prior exam versions you were able to click on “reset” to restart just one question, if you do so in this project based exam, you reset the complete project and with this all your completed work. Even though you can do so, I strongly advice against using this option because you most likely will not be able to complete your work within the given time frame, especially when you are in the middle of it.

Suggested preparation materials from Microsoft is:
the MOS 2013 Study Guide, Exam 77-424
John Pierce
See link: MOS Study Guide Access 2013 (PDF)

Personally I found this information too generic to be really helpful. The skills you need are covered, however, more in a “what” than a “how to” manner. The practice exercises are quite shallow in my opinion and there is no review available to check your answers. This book does not claim to teach you Access and expects expertise with the program, however it does intend to prepare you for the exam, which is an overstatement. My experience with this study guide is that it is OK to use as supplement to other preparation materials, but no more than that.

Study Guide Recommendation:

New Perspectives Series: Access 2013 Comprehensive
Cengage Learning: U.S region or UK region Access 2013 NP Comprehensive

ISBN-13: 978-1285099200
ISBN-10: 1285099206
Also found on Amazon: Access 2013 NP Comprehensive in either a Kindle or paperback version.
The Amazon book does not include the student data files, you need to download these directly from Cengage.

I am including here a downloadable Access 2013 Certification Grid from New Perspectives in which all skills are covered with their specific pages references.

About the New Perspectives Series

The New Perspective Series for MS Office are written for college based semester courses and I have had the true pleasure of being able to use these materials extensively in the classroom with my students. Their curriculum design work is absolutely outstanding and extremely well written.

I often have stated to my students that this curriculum design work is “true art” and this Access 2013 book is not an exception. The practice exercises are very well thought through, and include realistic business scenarios. The review practice exercises are directly based on the step-by-step tutorials, and the case projects are slightly more challenging building on the skills covered.

In on-line reviews about the New Perspectives Series, I have found complaints about the pricing, however, the curriculum design work is on such a higher level compared to other materials, that in my opinion these books reflect their true price value and it is in my opinion not an expense but a well worth investment.

GMETRIX Practice Tests:

Even though there currently are other practice exams available, I strongly recommend using the GMetrix practice exams. For $75 you can purchase all the MS Office 2013 exams, which is an excellent price if you are serious about taking the MOS certification exams. The purchase also includes direct access to the Office 2010 exam prep version. The MS Office version installed on your computer needs to be compatible with the practice exams you are taking in order to access the practice exams. In other words, you can’t access the 2013 prep exam with an installation of Office 2010 or vice versa.

You can purchase these from the Certiport web site or directly from GMetrix’ site:
Go to:
Certiport : GMetrix Practice Tests or
GMetrix : GMetrix Practice Tests

If you are planning on taking multiple exams, I highly recommend purchasing all the exams for $75 versus $40 for just one exam only.

In regards to Access 2013, the GMetrix practice tests include 2 tests with individual unrelated questions (similar to the Office 2010 and prior exam format) and 2 project based practice exams, which can be taken in training or testing mode.

Particularly, the Access 2013 Project 2 test is a very good representation of skills covered in the real exam.

Please refer to my downloadable file GMetrix Access info.pdf for more information.

Good luck on your exam!