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C/R Exam # 4600 (Open-Competitive)


NJMike73

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1 hour ago, Lawrence St said:

What's the difference between Conductor OC and Conductor Pro?

OC means open competitive for the public 

PRO means promotion. Only those who are in a MTA position whether it may be station agent, track worker or dispatcher ect. And they want to switch departments they will then need to take a promotion test. 

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13 hours ago, Mohamed said:

OC means open competitive for the public 

PRO means promotion. Only those who are in a MTA position whether it may be station agent, track worker or dispatcher ect. And they want to switch departments they will then need to take a promotion test. 

They're finally doing another Conductor exam! Hoorah!

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  • 3 months later...
  • +Young+ changed the title to C/R Exam # 3615 (Open-Competitive)
3 hours ago, casanova2469 said:

What kids of questions are they going to ask? Is there a manual to read before taking the test?

Although the Notice of Examination (NOE) is not going to be posted until June, as per this website, one of the things which I would strongly recommend is to look at the prior NOE, which can be found here. If you carefully look towards the bottom of page four of the PDF document, you will see the things that they asked on the last Civil Service Exam back in 2016.

There isn't a "manual" to read, however one of the books which I would recommend using as a "study tool" is titled Surfing Through New York Transit Exams: Train Operator - Conductor, For Open Competitive and Promotional Exams. What's nice is that the book was copyrighted in 2019, and is very similar to the last Open-Competitive Conductor Examination that I took. In addition, the format of the practice examinations that are in this book are very similar to the last Bus Operator examinations that I took as well.

As a word of warning, I would stay away from those green and yellow or blue and white "passbooks." Although I borrowed one or two of these out of my local library to save money, since the questions were so outdated, I returned it and I haven't looked at another one of these "passbooks" ever since.

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  • 2 weeks later...
On 4/18/2023 at 5:11 PM, +Young+ said:

Although the Notice of Examination (NOE) is not going to be posted until June, as per this website, one of the things which I would strongly recommend is to look at the prior NOE, which can be found here. If you carefully look towards the bottom of page four of the PDF document, you will see the things that they asked on the last Civil Service Exam back in 2016.

There isn't a "manual" to read, however one of the books which I would recommend using as a "study tool" is titled Surfing Through New York Transit Exams: Train Operator - Conductor, For Open Competitive and Promotional Exams. What's nice is that the book was copyrighted in 2019, and is very similar to the last Open-Competitive Conductor Examination that I took. In addition, the format of the practice examinations that are in this book are very similar to the last Bus Operator examinations that I took as well.

As a word of warning, I would stay away from those green and yellow or blue and white "passbooks." Although I borrowed one or two of these out of my local library to save money, since the questions were so outdated, I returned it and I haven't looked at another one of these "passbooks" ever since.

hi !! do you have any more insights on how the book is structured? im interested, but $40 is a little steep (for me) without being able to preview a table of contents. would love some more info before i dive in :) 

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14 hours ago, sunnyd said:

hi !! do you have any more insights on how the book is structured? im interested, but $40 is a little steep (for me) without being able to preview a table of contents. would love some more info before i dive in :) 

To make a long story short: There are a couple of introduction chapters, and then there is a chapter which contains the practice test for Train Operator (Promotion), another chapter for Train Operator (Open-Competitive), Conductor (Promotion) and Conductor (Open-Competitive). The introduction chapters are important to read, especially if this is the first civil service examination that you are taking.

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7 hours ago, +Young+ said:

To make a long story short: There are a couple of introduction chapters, and then there is a chapter which contains the practice test for Train Operator (Promotion), another chapter for Train Operator (Open-Competitive), Conductor (Promotion) and Conductor (Open-Competitive). The introduction chapters are important to read, especially if this is the first civil service examination that you are taking.

awesome! thank you so much :) will def be purchasing soon. appreciate the clarity! 

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19 hours ago, sunnyd said:

awesome! thank you so much :) will def be purchasing soon. appreciate the clarity! 

You're welcome! If anything, the Notice of Examination (NOE) for the Promotional examination was just published. If you look at page three of the PDF document, you will see a list of items that will be on their examination, which will probably be on the Open-Competitive one as well. From prior experience, most people screw up on the "Short term memorization" section.

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  • 2 weeks later...
5 hours ago, JRED98 said:

Hey I just went on the mta exam site and they removed the conductor exam for this upcoming June. Does that mean that they cancelled it for good?

First of all, welcome to the Forums!

Second, to answer your question, only time will tell. Hopefully the Examinations Unit will post the exam schedule for the second half of 2023 soon, and then we will take it from there. After all, the amount of names from Exam # 6601 consists of about 32,000 people, so even if they move the application period for this examination back a month or two, as they say, it's better to be safe rather than be sorry.

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  • 2 weeks later...
On 5/12/2023 at 12:19 PM, +Young+ said:

First of all, welcome to the Forums!

Second, to answer your question, only time will tell. Hopefully the Examinations Unit will post the exam schedule for the second half of 2023 soon, and then we will take it from there. After all, the amount of names from Exam # 6601 consists of about 32,000 people, so even if they move the application period for this examination back a month or two, as they say, it's better to be safe rather than be sorry.

Could you elaborate on "better to be safe rather than sorry"? To me, it sounds like they will not be posting the exam any time soon, at least not this year. I truly hope that isn't the case, but out of curiosity since I'm sorta new to this side of the forums, but how long will this whole process take if I were to take the exam to becoming a conductor?

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On 5/12/2023 at 12:19 PM, +Young+ said:

First of all, welcome to the Forums!

Second, to answer your question, only time will tell. Hopefully the Examinations Unit will post the exam schedule for the second half of 2023 soon, and then we will take it from there. After all, the amount of names from Exam # 6601 consists of about 32,000 people, so even if they move the application period for this examination back a month or two, as they say, it's better to be safe rather than be sorry.

But in all fairness, they have been waiting way too long to post a new exam. New people should be given an opportunity to take it and not keep extending the same list 200 times.

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1 hour ago, Lawrence St said:

But in all fairness, they have been waiting way too long to post a new exam. New people should be given an opportunity to take it and not keep extending the same list 200 times.

I agree 100%. After all, from looking at the Civil Service List (Active) webpage, I have no clue why the list for Exam # 4600 for Bus Operator, which was supposed to expire back in 2020, has been extended to 2024, however that's just me.

1 hour ago, Vulturious said:

Could you elaborate on "better to be safe rather than sorry"? To me, it sounds like they will not be posting the exam any time soon, at least not this year. I truly hope that isn't the case, but out of curiosity since I'm sorta new to this side of the forums, but how long will this whole process take if I were to take the exam to becoming a conductor?

When the last Open-Competitive Conductor Examination was administered, approximately 32,000 people passed the exam. I am estimating that approximately 36,000 to 40,000 people initially took the examination. Therefore, since this is a very popular examination, I am assuming that the Examinations Unit wants to get their "kinks" out in an effort to minimize the number of complaints. One of these "kinks" is to make sure that they have a high school or two available for use on several weekends in order to administer the examination. After all, how can you publish a Notice of Examination if you don't have an examination date?

As far as how long the whole process were to take - I would say several years and not months. As an example, back in the summer of 2017 I took Exam 8302 for Motor Vehicle Operator. If you were to type "8302" into the search box of the Civil Service List (Active) webpage, you will see that the list for this particular examination was established within the last two months. And, since this is Civil Service, they call in list number order, from whoever got a 100% on the multiple choice Civil Service exam, to whoever got a 70% of the multiple choice Civil Service exam, which is the minimum passing score.

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On 5/23/2023 at 11:27 PM, +Young+ said:

I agree 100%. After all, from looking at the Civil Service List (Active) webpage, I have no clue why the list for Exam # 4600 for Bus Operator, which was supposed to expire back in 2020, has been extended to 2024, however that's just me.

When the last Open-Competitive Conductor Examination was administered, approximately 32,000 people passed the exam. I am estimating that approximately 36,000 to 40,000 people initially took the examination. Therefore, since this is a very popular examination, I am assuming that the Examinations Unit wants to get their "kinks" out in an effort to minimize the number of complaints. One of these "kinks" is to make sure that they have a high school or two available for use on several weekends in order to administer the examination. After all, how can you publish a Notice of Examination if you don't have an examination date?

As far as how long the whole process were to take - I would say several years and not months. As an example, back in the summer of 2017 I took Exam 8302 for Motor Vehicle Operator. If you were to type "8302" into the search box of the Civil Service List (Active) webpage, you will see that the list for this particular examination was established within the last two months. And, since this is Civil Service, they call in list number order, from whoever got a 100% on the multiple choice Civil Service exam, to whoever got a 70% of the multiple choice Civil Service exam, which is the minimum passing score.

When will they have the next motor vehicle operator exam? 

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10 hours ago, 2ride said:

When will they have the next motor vehicle operator exam? 

First of all, a separate thread/topic has been created for this particular examination, which can be viewed here. As per the guidelines of the website, if you can please "post in the relevant forum," it would be appreciated.

Second, to answer your question, I would say the next Motor Vehicle Operator Exam will come out within the next year or two. Check this website periodically for more information.

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As of today, Thursday, June 1st, 2023, the Exam Schedule has been updated, in which the new application period for the Open-Competitive Conductor Examination, Exam # 4600, will be from October 1st to October 27th, 2023.

In the meantime, if you wish to view the last Notice of Examination for this position, which includes, but not limited to, what was on the Civil Service multiple-choice examination back in 2016, click here.

Happy Posting!!

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  • +Young+ changed the title to C/R Exam # 4600 (Open-Competitive)
On 6/1/2023 at 11:32 AM, +Young+ said:

As of today, Thursday, June 1st, 2023, the Exam Schedule has been updated, in which the new application period for the Open-Competitive Conductor Examination, Exam # 4600, will be from October 1st to October 27th, 2023.

In the meantime, if you wish to view the last Notice of Examination for this position, which includes, but not limited to, what was on the Civil Service multiple-choice examination back in 2016, click here.

Happy Posting!!

Hi, thanks for this update and all the helpful information you post on this forum!

For those of us interested in multiple positions within the MTA, would you recommend taking exams for multiple titles?

For instance, I heard the rumors about the Train Operator position becoming Promotional only, so my plan was to take the Conductor exam with hopes of promoting into Operator one day. With the announcement of the Open Competitive Train Operator exam, this changes everything, and now I'm wondering if I should only be applying to that one since that's the job I would really love. But I also would be happy as a Conductor.. just really wanna work in transit!

Also interested in Bus Operator but I am not eligible (haven't had a Driver's License for 3 years yet)

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41 minutes ago, banjo said:

Hi, thanks for this update and all the helpful information you post on this forum!

For those of us interested in multiple positions within the MTA, would you recommend taking exams for multiple titles?

For instance, I heard the rumors about the Train Operator position becoming Promotional only, so my plan was to take the Conductor exam with hopes of promoting into Operator one day. With the announcement of the Open Competitive Train Operator exam, this changes everything, and now I'm wondering if I should only be applying to that one since that's the job I would really love. But I also would be happy as a Conductor.. just really wanna work in transit!

Also interested in Bus Operator but I am not eligible (haven't had a Driver's License for 3 years yet)

Take as many as you want. You can start off as a Conductor and go to another title via an OC exam. Promotional exams require you to be in certain titles for a specified period of time to be eligible to take the exam or be called from it.

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12 hours ago, SevenEleven said:

Take as many as you want. You can start off as a Conductor and go to another title via an OC exam. Promotional exams require you to be in certain titles for a specified period of time to be eligible to take the exam or be called from it.

Good to know, thanks! If someone in an existing MTA position takes on a new role after Promotional exam (or OC for a different title as you mentioned) and they fail their training for the new position (which I have heard happening to promoted T/O) would they go back to their old title or the MTA would let them go entirely?

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4 hours ago, banjo said:

Good to know, thanks! If someone in an existing MTA position takes on a new role after Promotional exam (or OC for a different title as you mentioned) and they fail their training for the new position (which I have heard happening to promoted T/O) would they go back to their old title or the MTA would let them go entirely?

As long as you completed 1 year in your previous title you’ll return to it. You absolutely should take as many exams that you qualify for I wish I could’ve taken the last TO exam I didn’t meet the qualifications. I’m a C/R now and had to wait 5 years for the next TO exam which I’ll be applying for in August.

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42 minutes ago, Jchambers2120 said:

As long as you completed 1 year in your previous title you’ll return to it. You absolutely should take as many exams that you qualify for I wish I could’ve taken the last TO exam I didn’t meet the qualifications. I’m a C/R now and had to wait 5 years for the next TO exam which I’ll be applying for in August.

That's great news. Good luck on the exam! If that situation happens after year(s) of pay increases in the position, do they let you go back to the hourly rate with earned raises, or have to start all over again at starting pay rate?

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