What is on
the NYC Correction Officer exam?

The short answer

Eleven sections — the longest ability list in the whole line, and the only one here that names both Number Facility and Mathematical Reasoning.

Our practice exam runs 110 questions in 141 minutes, in the order below.

What makes this title different

Spatial Orientation here is a jail map.

Eleven abilities sounds like a wider exam than it is. Six of them are reading and reasoning about written orders, which is the bulk of a correction officer's paperwork.

What each section is asking for

Written Comprehension is reading a rule or an order and saying what it does and does not cover. Deductive Reasoning is taking a rule you were handed a moment ago and applying it to one case. Number Facility is plain arithmetic, quickly. Inductive Reasoning is several incidents, and the pattern that fits all of them. Information Ordering is putting steps into the order a procedure requires. Problem Sensitivity is noticing something is wrong before anybody tells you it is. Memorization is the count and the movement sheet, after they are taken away. Mathematical Reasoning is choosing which arithmetic the situation calls for. Written Expression is writing it down so the next person reads it the way you meant it. Spatial Orientation is orienting yourself on a jail map, tier by tier. Visualization is an object turned over, as it would be in a search.

None of it is a knowledge test. You do not need to arrive knowing the minimum standards, the count procedure or the layout of any facility. Everything the question needs is on the page. What is being measured is whether you can use it with the clock running.

What the City publishes, and what is ours

DCAS names 11 abilities for this title, in Notice of Examination 6301–6303. What the notice does not give is a question count or a time limit, for this title or any other. Nobody outside the City has those two numbers, so a site quoting them is quoting a guess.

The 11 sections above are the City's. The 110 questions and the 141 minutes are ours. We picked them so the practice sitting feels like the real thing, and we would rather tell you that than let you assume the City set them.

What the notice says about the job

These come from Notice of Examination 6301–6303, not from us:

• Minimum salary: $54,652 a year, as the notice states it.
• Application fee: $68.00.
• Passing score: 70%. Your score then decides your position on the eligible list, which is the part that actually determines when you are called.
• What you need to apply: By the time you are appointed to this position , you must have: 1.

The Correction Officer notice runs three administrations at once, so a candidate who misses one filing window is usually waiting months rather than years for the next.