BJCP Written Exam Generator

This is one of the odd posts of this blog written in English. I don’t usually do that, it takes too much time. But since this is about the BJCP, I made an exception. In particular, I would like to start sharing some knowledge about the BJCP Written Proficiency Exam. This will be just a start, more posts are coming in the next months. Since just a scant bunch of people in Italy are interested in the Written Exam, I thought that writing this posts in English would broaden the audience.

I am a Certified BJCP beer judge, already enrolled to take the Written Proficiency Exam in Rome, next October (15th October 2022).

To be eligible for taking the Written Exam you should be a Certified Judge, have a minimum score of 80 at the Tasting Exam and at least 10 Experience points. If you get a combined score from 80 onward between the Tasting and the Written Exam, and have at least 20 Experience points, you get to the National level (more on that here).

For those who are not familiar with the BJCP Program, the Written Exam consists in 5 mini-essay questions about beer and 20 generic T/F questions about judging.

To be more specific:

• 20 T/F questions, chosen from this pool of 124 questions
• 2 mini-essays on confronting 3 beer styles at a time. Styles triplets are taken from this pool of 91 triplets
• 1 style recipe mini-essay, chosen from this pool of 12 styles
• 1 mini-essay on beer characteristics, 3 at a time, taken from this pool of 14 beer characteristics. One jolly question is about beer and mouthfeel, which extends the pool to 15 beer characteristics.
• 1 mini essay on process and ingredients, chosen among this pool of 6 topics

In total the examinee has 1.30 hours to complete the Written Exam. Timing could look something like this:

• 2 mins – T/F questions (ends at 0.02 hours)
• 18 mins – Q1 Style Comparison (ends at 0.20 hours)
• 20 mins – Q2 Recipe (ends at 0.40 hours
• 20 mins – Q3 Style Comparison (ends at 1.00 hours)
• 15 mins – Q4 Beer Characteristics (ends at 1.15 hours)
• 15 mins – Q5 Process and Ingredients (ends at 1.30 hours)

There’s really no spare time to think or try to remember stuff during the exam, preparation and memorization are going to be pivotal. You’ll get there with some studying and practicing regularly. All exam is hand-written, cramps are going to burst if your hand isn’t prepared for the ride.

To get there I am practicing the various parts of the exam separately, sometimes getting through the whole lot. Since the question pool is known, I built an Excel file which randomizes all the questions (including the T/F) selecting them randomly from the pool.

There are already some tools that do that online (link1, link2), but the pool from which they choose the questions isn’t disclosed. Since it changes every now and then, I preferred to be on the safe side and updated it myself. Moreover, it is handy to have the T/F questions and the essay questions all together in one single place.

[SPOILER: my score was a stunning 93/100! More on that here]

Here you can download the file. Reach out to me if something feels wrong. Macros should be enabled in Excel, otherwise the RANDOMIZE button won’t work.

BJCP Written Exam Generator

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