Engineering Entrance - Unified Approach

A few entrance exams have been added in past few years - AIEEE, BITSAT, ISAT to name a few. If every autonomous institute worth its salt demands a separate entrance exam, then one can imagine the difficulty and chaos it will create. A common procedure for entrance that is being thought of has multi-dimensional challenges in implementation. Here are two approaches to solve some of them:

Approach A: There are three components in this common procedure:

1. Increased weight age of school system (makes sense, as school is the place where overall personality can be developed with participation is public speaking, sports, projects and so on). This part is most challenging from implementation perspective due to the variations present whose resolution may include changes in educational system in certain aspects.
2. An aptitude test somewhat on the lines of SAT. This test can be called NAT or something else. This may be a non C/M/P type of test.
3. An advanced level entrance test in C/M/P. This test can be called ANAT (advanced NAT) or JEE or anything else and can be conducted by IIT/CBSE or any other body.

There needs to be a solution to the problem if the student misses any one of these two tests namely NAT and ANAT due to health related problem or some other valid reason. If NAT does not include subjects of class 12th, then it can be conducted a few times in a year and the student can choose when he/she wants to appear in that. ANAT may involve C/M/P of class 12th+11th level and hence can only be conducted in later part of 12th or after 12th. This can be made an extended duration test (say, 45 days) where a student can choose the day on which he would like to appear for it. Such type of test may be possible to conduct using secure computer* network.

Medical subjects can also be added and the same applies to specialised tests like that of architecture.

Approach B: There are two components in this common procedure:

1. Increased weight age of school system. As mention earlier, this part is most challenging from implementation perspective.
2. A test in C/M/P/General Aptitude. This test can be called NAT/JEE or something else and can be conducted by IIT/CBSE or any other body and is to be conducted in later part of 12th or after 12th.

Due to the reason stated earlier, this can be made an extended duration test (say, 45 days).

Other subjects can also be added if required.

*An alternate approach to using secure computer network based testing would be to conduct test(s) 2 to 3 times with some space in between in which case there will be operational challenges considering very large number of students appearing for these tests. Moreover, if the tests are objective in nature, they can be conducted very efficiently using computer network.

Engineering Entrance - Unified Approach

Corrective Measures for the Errors in JEE-2010: An Analysis

Error/Issue	Corrective Measure Proposed on 2nd May	Remarks
1: The subject headings Physics and Mathematics in the ORS are interchanged.	Each ORS (both for Paper 1 & Paper 2) will be evaluated in two ways (sequential question number-wise and subject headings-wise). In each case the higher score of the two evaluations will be taken as the candidate's score.  Should one of the ways of evaluating lead to a mark below the minimum qualifying mark in one of the subjects, the other way will be deemed to be the ‘higher’ of the two scores.	Different students react to such errors differently under exam condition. It would have cost some students more time, some less time and some would possibly have ignored it.
2. Question 44 in the Mathematics section of Paper 1 in code 4 of the Hindi version was not printed.	The ORS of the candidates who were given Code 4 of the Hindi version of the Question Paper 1 will be evaluated omitting Question 44 and the overall score for the Mathematics section of Paper 1 of those candidates will be appropriately scaled.	The students who had these types of papers did fewer questions in the same time in comparison to others who had to do more questions in the same time. Will it not be an unfair way to scale?
3. The Instructions on “Question Paper Format and Marking Scheme” for section IV in the Hindi version of Paper 2 was wrongly printed. Each question in this section was shown to carry 3 marks instead of 8.	Each question of section IV of Paper 2 will be evaluated for 8 marks.	The student selects questions on the basis of how good the student is for a particular question and how many marks would that question fetch. Clearly, this issue affects the strategy for taking the question paper and can affect rank.
4. In a few cases the question paper contained two unreadable pages and two partially readable pages in the Physics section of Paper 1.	Since the registration numbers of these candidates have been taken note of at the time of the examination, their ORS will be evaluated omitting the unreadable questions and their scores for the Physics section of Paper 1 will then be appropriately scaled.	The students who had these types of papers did fewer questions in the same time in comparison to others who had to do more questions in the same time. Will it not be an unfair way to scale?
5. In more than one answer correct questions partial marks were there with no negative marking. A student marking all bubbles should get full marks as there was no negative marking.	None, but earlier in media this is what has been said: no mark will be awarded at all if there is even one incorrect option chosen.	This clause was not there in the instructions for taking test. So, strictly it is not fair to insert such clause after the test is over.

The high density ranks (lower ranks) are likely to be most affected by this, high ranks should be affected less. Conducting the exam again appears to be as the most fair solution with the current proposal. However, at this point JAB seems to be in no mood to conduct the exam again. According to the poll conducted by 123iitjee.com, the majority is in favour of conducting the test again.

Corrective Measures for the Errors in JEE-2010: An Analysis

The Last Mile: Some Tips for JEE 2010 Examinees

• Do not pay too much emphasis on new topic. It is quite difficult to master a new topic in limited time. It is better to practice the areas that you are already familiar with. Remember that in quality exams it is the depth that matters and not just the shallow width.
• Take care of your health. The exam is just once a year as you know. The most important thing in this respect in this season is drinking water. A negligence on this account could be very costly.
• Expose yourself to new situations. Try to do new types of problems. Do not spend time in doing similar type of problems if you are comfortable with that particular type.
• Human memory functions on the principle of repetition. It is not good enough to review two days before the exam. Have a periodic review plan in place right now. The formulae should be in your finger tips.
• If you have habit of writing every step while doing a problem, try avoiding this habit for an objective exam where it is not valued. Writing every step takes time and may not be in your interest in this type of exam.
• Brush up with some quick calculations (like taking pi square as 10 approximately) and use them often. When options are not too close, approximate calculations can be very useful.
• Some unconventional methods are especially useful in objective questions like elimination of options, boundary conditions, variable substitution, dimensional analysis etc. It may be good idea of getting used to them.
• Have an open mind about the type of paper. Do not think that last year's pattern will be repeated. Read the instructions given in the paper carefully. Remember that everyone is in the same boat as far as this aspect goes. All you can do is to expose yourself to different situations.
• It does not make sense to leave the answer(s) blank to the question(s)  without negative marking (if any).
• You have been allotted certain amount of time for the test. There is no reason for you to submit the paper with significant time left. You need to fight till the very end.
• Put yourself under time bound test conditions to get accustomed. But, too much of blind test taking may not help especially at the expense of solid conceptual foundation. Only deep understanding & the ability to face new situations can get you through JEE.
• Put aside fear of failure (if any) or negative thoughts (if any) by telling yourself that your job is to do to the best of your abilities, rest is beyond your control.
• Class 12th students writing exam this year thinking that there is little gap between the dates of board exam getting over and the JEE, leaving very less time for 11th portion revision and hence are reluctant to write JEE this year should nevertheless write JEE without thinking about, "What will others say?" If your assessment of your potential is incorrect then you may end up spending one attempt. As you know the current attempts for JEE are limited to two.

The Last Mile: Some Tips for JEE 2010 Examinees

IIT JEE: Molecular Orbital Theory Matrix Match 2009

IIT JEE: Molecular Orbital Theory Matrix Match 2009

Polar Area Q & A

Q: What is the concept of directed distance in polar area discussion in the topic on, "Area Under the Curves"?

A: Click here to download the video (.wmv file) explaining this.

Polar Area Q & A