The CBSE recently announced the dates of JEE (Main) last week and as of now, students aspiring to get into the IITs, NITs, IIITs and other reputed institutes seem certain of only one fact – they have perform well in two tests and board exams to get into the best institutes.
However, a lot remains unclear including the syllabi of the entrance tests.
The Joint Entrance Exam will be conducted in two parts - JEE (Main) and JEE Advanced. The offline examination for JEE (Main) will be held on April 7, 2013 and the online examinations on different dates in April. Only 1.5 lakh of the top rankers in JEE (Main) will be eligible to write the JEE (Advanced) - 2013, after which they will be shortlisted for the IITs.
“The syllabus is largely unknown. Earlier, the students who prepared for the JEE to get into the IITs would have a good chance at cracking the AIEEE – the qualifying exam for entry into the NITs and IIITs.” said R. Gurumurthy, former head (Chemistry department), Annamalai University, who trains students in clearing JEE.
But with the JEE (Main) test becoming the sole qualifying exam, students are confused on how to approach questions, say experts.
“The questions in AIEEE were objective and there was no negative marking. And the test had many topics. But JEE had limited topics and questions of different kinds with negative marking,” Prof Gurumurthy said.
Students and parents say that there is a lot of confusion in coaching institutes regarding the syllabus.
Ankur Jain, director, FIITJEE, feels that since no changes have been announced in the pattern, it would be beneficial for students to prepare for JEE (Main) with the AIEEE syllabus.
Many don’t know if they should let their children prepare for the JEE (Main) alone or for the advanced test as well. “It has been a confusing year and now. Two tests and school exams – it is getting tiring for many,” says R. Rajalakshmi, a parent.
This is also the first time school board results will be taken into account. “Last year’s statistics show that CBSE students may have to score 390/500 to clear the 80 percentile needed for the test. That may not be difficult as most aspirants get the score easily,” said K.K. Anand of Smart Classes. While board results does not influence student’s ranking in the IIT list, the NITs will give 40 per cent of weightage to board results.
Students who are not sure about getting into IITs but want to make it to the NITs are also worried. Gowrishankar, a class XII student of Sankara Vidyalaya said “It would be easy if we knew for sure what all to prepare so that we can focus only on the Mains and board. To improve school results, we have to score well in languages and electives that we have neglected all this while.”
