A simplified selection process for IITs is the need of the hour.
It is once again that time of the year when the broadsheets are flashed with one and sundry ads of coaching institutes, proudly proclaiming the success of their wards in the just concluded IIT-JEE Joint Entrance Exam – arguably one of the toughest entrances at the undergraduate level. The pages are in sync with passport sized photographs of cherubic youngsters barely 16-17 years of age and the customary ‘All India Rank XYZ’ secured by them alongside their names and the brand choice of the coaching institute neatly mentioned in tone and graphic.
For the youngsters, flush with their success, the admission process remains a carefully wrapped mysterious gift pack, which they must unravel and open with utmost care, lest they end up with a course and a stream not entirely of their liking or in the vicinity of their comfort zone. If one has a middle of the rungs rank then it calls for deft maneuvering to submit one’s ‘choices online.’ Now, this is no mean task and the IITs to be fair, give an easily downloadable online brochure that gives the numerous rules, regulations and guidelines for filling up the choices by the successful candidates. A cursory glance through the brochure reveals as much as it conceals. The choice of streams and courses form an impressive list and it becomes a hobson’s choice really as to how to rank the choices available at your disposal. How does one decide to go in for say BE (Mechanical) at IIT Mumbai or BE (Civil) at IIT Delhi or BE (Electronics) at IIT Madras? Further, how does a 16 year old, just out of school discern amongst these myriad career choices that ultimately will have a bearing on his or her future career? However, careful selection and consideration, can greatly affect the admission in stream of one’s choice, if one correlates it with one’s rank in the JEE based on last year ranks of the last person getting admission in that course and stream.
To illustrate this, let’s consider a case of student who manages a rank close to the 6500 mark. What kind of options would be open to him or her and how must he or she go about negotiating the ‘choice of stream’ admission process conundrum? Let’s say the student is a bright one and diligently goes through the brochure that mentions the rank of last person securing admission in last year’s JEE. Now, such a student hypothetically has the following three probable choices to choose from. These are B.Architecture at IIT Kharagpur, B.Architecture at IIT Roorkee and offbeat courses like B.Design at IIT Guwahati.
However, there is a catch and it is that the candidates desirous of seeking admission to these three courses must sit for a separate ‘Aptitude Test’, if they so wished. Thus, such a student must again appear for a second aptitude test in one of the IITs closest to his or her home. If at all “a student’s interest did not lie in these unconventional courses” he or she could very well alter his or her choices at the time of the admission process by giving newer choices. Such a move would come with inherent “risk of uncertainty” involved – if he or she chooses a course preferred by higher ranked individuals, he or she would be automatically and algorithmically be eliminated by computersand the software programmes at the co-ordinating IIT conducting the ‘Online admission process.’ Thus, BE Electonics or Computers looks a distant dream and 5-year BSc Integrated Course in Physics, though achievable, has invariably lesser ‘high paying’ career options attached to it. So what should the student do?
Should he or she forgo ‘Brand IIT’ irrespective of course and stream of choice or settle in for the lower ranked, other NITs or even the high in fees demanding private institutes that will ensure an engineering degree even if it comes with a prohibitive price tag attached to it?
Let’s say the student decides to ambivalently try his luck and sit for the second aptitude gauging test. Here, again the coaching institutes beckon him and after siphoning off a few thousand rupees provide the much toted ‘sample test papers’ for the aptitude test. A bit of googling also gives enough sample test papers of NATA and SPA which has such questions as:
1. Imagine yourself to be shrunk to the size of an ant. You are placed inside a geometry box and now you have to sketch out any internal view of your surroundings. Draw it as best as you can and use pencil for shading. (Test of Visual and Spatial Ability)
2. What is the formulae of porcelain used in making bone china mugs? Plasticine? (Test of Diverse Knowledge)
3. Visualise yourself in an aircraft sitting by the window. As the plane takes off, sketch what you see from the aircraft window. (Test of Angles and Sizes and Curvature)
4. Draw a spice rack for a visually disabled person. You can place any masala out of these : Turmeric, Salt, Pepper, Red Chilly, Coriander, Astoefida, Cumin – all in powder form except Cumin seeds. (Common Sense and Utility Test)
5. A rope is tied upto halfway of the top hull from the deck of a boat. Onset of flood means that water starts rising at the inflow rate of 100 cc per minute. After how many hours, minutes and seconds, will the water touch the rope? (IQ Test)
Reasonable confident of tackling the ‘interest led’ questions in the Aptitude Test, our student goes and gives the second exam. As luck and hard work and the ‘well-oiled success machines’ behind the scenes make it possible for the prospective student to clear this hurdle as well. The student to ensure success in the ‘choice test’ would have to rank B.Arch or B.Des as 1st and 2nd choices and then the rest of the conventional engineering courses such as electronics and communications, civil, mechanical, chemical, electrical and so on and so forth, if he or she has to have a more than fair chance of getting selected in the said courses. This slight catch escapes the mind of even the brightest of students who plunge in for course just out of their reach in the ‘choice-rank’ correlation test.
However, there are a lot of well-wishers who influence choices. If a student listens to such advice and fills the choices giving first preference to computer engineering, electronics, mechanical and the nth streams on display in brochure, does he or she stand a chance of realistic selection through elimination? Let’s say the student then places B.Design of Guwahati at 72 rank and B.Architecture at Roorkee and Kharagpur at 144 and 156!!! Probabilistically, it is clear than Rank 1, 2 and 3 in choices had anything but B.Architecture and B.Design. Does the student still have a chance of getting selected in say B.Des, given the ‘error of judgement’ that has been induced in his or her choice as a result of the well-meaning advice? Or would this blunder in filling the choices incorrectly leave the IITs few seats ‘unfilled’ at the end of the rigorous selection process? From the ‘product’ point of view, does B.Des at IIT-G make for a better choice than say BE from Institute of Engineering and Technology at Lucknow? What is the trade-off involved from choice and career point of view here? Unfortunately, unlike linear regression and correlation models, there are no real or imaginary ‘line of best fits’ here that can take care of the outliers and predict future outcomes safely. Even the method of seeing last year’s ranks and then filling choices as per “what you are most likely to get” is not foolproof and based on the premise that last year’s rank-choices will in all probability will follow this year’s ‘normal curve’ in selection process. Thus, this too is based on assumption but in the absence of other data, seems most plausible and correct with a reduced margin of standard error in the offing.
The question that IITs must answer is whether such a selection process justifies the ‘all round performance’ that they seek to gauge in a prospective student? Does the frequent changes in selection yardstick such as giving weightage to Class XII board performance ‘tests significantly’ the worth of the intended product that might have bungled the boards due to the incessant pressure for preparing for the Joint Entrance? If parents, teachers and coaching institutes are involved in filling choices, then is it the correct method of pre-selecting students? What about students from far flung rural areas who may not have access to such ‘quantitative bent of mind’ or ready ‘coaching class’ help? Must they lose always then, even if they have a rank higher than say 6500? The need of the hour then, is for transparency in IITs selection process and ensuring that students understand the many facets of selection and elimination beforehand itself rather than fall prey to such ‘methods in selection’ and learning by doing. How often have we heard of students who cleared IIT but failed in Boards? Or for that matter the ‘numerous drop year’ cases who sit out 1 or 2 years to again eliminate their mistakes or hope to get the desired stream choice next time round? Isn’t there a fair psychological cost involved in the psyche of such students who were nearly there? More importantly, must the students alone pay the price for such misdemeanour? What about the numerous students who then opt for a BCom or a BSc, if they fail to break the jigsaw in the second attempt as well? A clear selection methodology and introspection is the need of the hour on the part of the IITs. And we are not talking about just merit here. A selection process must be fair so that both the selected and the one who missed it, do not feel adversely about the final outcome. Or worse, are forced into a career by default option because of ostensibly pressing the wrong buttons on the course matrix.
For the students, as you will see life is a strange path in which success or failure is not fixed even if you make the ‘wrong choices’. The only thing that determines this is yourkarma – what you did when you were required to make and take your decision. There is much satisfaction in knowing that you gave it everything, not 99.99% but 100% and leave the result in the hands of the almighty.
And if the IITs have an ear to the ground, “please for a change think from the product point of view. In your case the product is not a ‘vegetable’ or a ‘pre-designed robot’, but a normal human being with normal fallacies and infallacies. A simplified selection process is the need of the hour. Keeping seats vacant year after year smacks of selection incompetency and mismatch in what a student desires, what he or she is capable of and what he or she ultimately gets.”
How to rank your choices?
What are the lessons from this real life story to the prospective students?
1. Do not think that “wishes can be horses and therefore beggars can ride.” Although, last year’s ranks may not replicate this year, in the absence of any other selection method and based on most probable pattern, it is best to see what the last person securing your rank last year got in the seat allocations. Make these your 1, 2, 3 and so on choices as the chances of you getting this is much higher than conventional high rankers choice streams of regular engineering courses.
2. Read the brochure carefully. If possible sit for the aptitude test, if your rank is not so good.
3. Do not leave the filling of choices for the eleventh hour, the internet connection might be down or electricity could go off just when you are uploading your form, making you lose precious seconds and miss the deadline.
4. Remember once uploaded there is no way you can “revisit” or ‘correct’ your filled in choices.
5. Go by your rank and what the person securing your rank got admission in, say, last year. This is not a foolproof method but the most probabilistic and likely method of selection.
6. Asking you to fill your choice is a method of ‘elimination’. If you fill the choices incorrectly, you lose out, no one else will. Therefore, it is paramount that you fill in the choices as per what you feel is best for you.
7. Listen to advice of elders – parents, class teachers, coaching institute instructors, friends and peers. However, weigh their advice and temper it in light with your own leanings, interests and focus areas. Then fill your choices. It is ironic that students have to fill choices scarcely knowing what it will lead to at the end of the tunnel.
8. After first year there is provision of branch change open to just top 10 per cent top performers within each course in every IIT. So even if you have missed the bus, who knows it might be waiting for you at another corner subject to perseverance and diligence.
9. Be open-minded and willing to look beyond conventional courses. The world, thankfully, is not run by engineers alone. Even if you do not get engineering stream, remember it is not the end of the world or curtains for your career. Who knows it might just save you from an academic catastrophe – what if you got what you wanted and found it too tough and therefore plugged in exams? Would you be happy then?
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