NWAE Exam: Did you know?

Did you know that the Navy-wide Advancement Exam (NWAE) is made up of two unique sections? The 175-question exam has 150 questions that are directly tied to occupational work and tasks of the next-higher paygrade. A smaller portion of the exam, 25 questions, assess the understanding of professional military knowledge (PMK). The PMK portion of the exam has questions about Navy history, programs, policies and other information that is generic to all Sailors at the next-higher paygrade.

The purpose of the exam is to rank-order advancement candidates based on their standing among peers in the same paygrade and rating. The exam standard score (SS) represents that standing, and is part of your overall Final Multiple Score (FMS).

Each exam is scored by scanning Sailor answer sheets to garner a raw score from the number of questions answered correctly. That raw score is then converted into a Standard Score (SS) by building a distribution of all raw scores so that the person with the least number of correct questions gets an SS of 20, and the advancement candidate that answers the most questions correctly gets an SS of 80. Candidates who fail the exam are not included in the SS conversion.

This process is done for each rating and paygrade. Your SS is an element of the Final Multiple Score (FMS), which is used to rank-order candidates for advancement. The exam FMS element is an important discriminator because it gives the Navy a tool to equitably compare Sailors in an unbiased way.
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