Probation Officer:
timing and pacing

143 minutes over six sections

Our Probation Officer exam gives 108 questions 143 minutes, roughly 79 seconds each.

Time Sharing: generous on paper, tight in practice

At 87 seconds, Time Sharing has the most time per item, and it is still where people run short. Each question pairs an interview account with a case record, and the temptation is to read both in full. Read the question, find the one fact it asks about in each source, and compare those. The rest of the file is detail you do not need for that item.

Written Expression is quickest

At 73 seconds, these are short choices between versions of a sentence in a report. A pre-sentence report is read by a judge, and the right answer is the one a judge could not misread. Decide and move.

The reasoning middle

Written Comprehension, Deductive Reasoning and Information Ordering all sit at 80 seconds, with Problem Sensitivity at 77. These are case documents, longer than the passages on most entry exams, so skim the question first and read the document looking for its answer.

Nothing left empty can score. Answer every question.

DCAS does not publish a time limit for this exam; ours is a practice design.