I would love to say that I went in and demolished the test, but I can't. It was pretty difficult. I'm going to outline what you need to know and some helpful hints to prepare you for the test.
The Test Itself :
- When we look through optician related/created material, it's usually in a nice clean format with OD and OS parameters on separate lines. This is NOT how your test is formatted! It's all on one line, and it looks like crap. So be ready for that.
- Be sure to know how to navigate ALL types of notation. If your office/lab uses one type of Rx notation, start using another in your own time to get used to reading it. This applies to frames, lenses and patient measurements.
- If you're using a TI -Anything calculator, stop doing that. Go buy the cheapest calculator with trig functionality and then throw it out of the window of a fast moving car. That was the calculator I was provided. The screen had a dent in it directly over the first character position. Actually, the first calculator she wanted to give me had no trig functionality and she had to dig through her drawer to find that piece of (place poop emoji here). I'm not saying this will happen to you, but be prepared for it.
- The pencils they gave me didn't erase, but they did spread pencil lead all over my scratch paper in a fantastically nasty way.
Basically, just be prepared for the worst test set up possible and you'll be ok. The only way it could have been worse is if they released rabbid skunks into the testing area to battle off as you're doing slab-off calculations.
Test Content:
Obviously, I can't give you actual test questions, but I can tell you the material you need to study.
You could get by with the following items, but always go to multiple sources.
Essential Items:
- Advanced Opticians Tutorial (NAO)
- Many of the non-math questions are directly from this book, so get it.
- Optical Formulas Tutorial (NAO) *You can get it elsewhere, but why not support a great organization while your purchasing it.
Know the following chapters from Optical Formulas Tutorial:
- III -Lenses
- IV -Prism
- V -Surfacing and Finishing
- VI -Advanced Lens Formulas
If you can answer all the exercise and the review questions (including master level question with an *) at the end of each chapter, you'll be fine. If you only use the Advanced Optician Tutorial...you will not do well on this test. For some reason, the AOT has insufficient math review and the ABOAC test has a LOT of math questions.
- System for Ophthalmic Dispensing (Amazon). It's kind of the bible for our industry anyway, so just buy it already. If for anything, it's an amazing reference.
That's about it really. If anyone has questions, feel free to ask. Again, I'll be kind of limited to how I can answer for obvious ethical reasons.
-Robert Minardi ABO-AC <=====
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