Question bank for NEET, JEE now on website

Officials of Gujarat Secondary and Higher Secondary Education Board (GSHSEB) said that the question bank for HSC (science) students preparing for the Joint Entrance Exam (JEE), the common engineering test and National Eligibility Entrance Test (NEET), common medical entrance test for admission to colleges across India, has been uploaded on the board's official website. Students can download the material for free and use it to prepare for the entrance exams.

Officials also said that a helpline for SSC and HSC board students and their parents, will be launched from Friday. The toll-free number of the helpline is 1800 233 5500. The helpline will be active from February 15 to March 25. Students can call at any time from 8 am to 8 pm.

Later, the helpline will be activated from April 8 to 16 for students and parents who have questions regarding the Gujarat Common Entrance Test as well NEET and JEE.

Students seeking answers for questions regarding the exams and those feeling anxious and stressed can call the helpline. The number will be manned by both education and psychological counselors.

It needs mention that the board launched the question bank on February 6, for the benefit of students. Since there was tremendous response, the board decided to upload the question bank on its website.

"Given the response from students, there would have been an issue reprinting booklets. Plus, the students had to come to the DEO in each district to take the booklets. Hence we decided to upload the booklet for the benefit of the students," said a board official.

Officials said the question bank consists of 3,015 questions in physics, 3,488 in chemistry, 4,789 in biology and 1,980 questions in maths.

Medical PG entrance aspirants sweat it out for forms

Applicants to post graduate courses in medicine and surgery had a tough time on Thursday as they queued up for procuring application forms for the entrance examinations. There was chaos and confusion as the mode of conduct of examination had been changed from this year with the National Board of Examinations entrusted with the task to conduct the tests. The entrance examinations for various MD and MS courses as well as post graduate diplomas are scheduled to be conducted between November-end and December. The applications forms for the diploma courses began to be distributed from Wednesday while forms for MD and MS entrance tests started to be issued from Thursday.

Hundreds of MBBS graduates and their parents waited for hours in front of the Axis Bank branch near the Lakshmi Mills junction in the city, which was the only centre from where students could get tokens on payment of fees. They had to upload a secret number then on the internet. Students complained that the bank did not have necessary facilities to cater to such a large crowd.

Dr N Sakthivel, who is taking entrance tests for both PG degree and diploma courses, said they had to wait for almost six hours to get tokens. "We were waiting from around 6am on both days," he said. Though the applications will be available for the next two weeks, students had come in large number on the first day itself as the number of centres in south India was limited, he said.

Dr H V Manjari, who waited till 12pm to get the application forms, complained that the entire process was disorganised. "There is only one centre in the city to issues applications. There are only few centres in south India which have been filled up in the early hours. Now the centres vacant are in Assam, Kashmir and other distant places," she said. Till the last year, the All India institute of Medical Science (AIIMS) used to conduct the entrance examinations. "They used to conduct it in a commendable manner," said Dr Vyshali Mohan another aspirant.

The number of centres for the examinations must be increased from the present 30. Around 2 lakh students appear for the examinations and there ought to be more centres, students point out.

However, bank officials blamed server problems for the chaos. "Extra counters were arranged, but the server got jammed. Similar problems were reported from other parts of the country also," a bank official said.

JEE Main Online application forms from Nov 1

The newly introduced Joint Entrance Examination (Main) for admission to various engineering colleges across the country will be conducted in April 2013 for the first time. The examination will be conducted by the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) which released a detailed document on examination earlier this month. The application forms for the JEE (Main) 2013 will be available online from Thursday, November 01, 2012. There will be no sale of paper application forms.

The CBSE has set up facilitation centers across the country which will help candidates complete their online application forms. 43 centers have been announced and more are expected to be added over the next few weeks. The services at these centers will be available free of cost.

The document with the details of the examination which was released recently confirmed that the offline mode of the examination will be held on April 07, 2013 and the online mode will be conducted between April 8 and 25, 2013. The document further stated that the blind candidates will be given an extra hour to complete the exam along with the help of writers. The document also revealed that a candidate will be allowed three consecutive attempts for the JEE (Main) examination.

Tough time for med aspirants after admission round limit

The worries of students and their parents in securinga seat in a private medical college has taken a different form this year.

A Supreme Court order says the Association for Private Unaided Medical and Dental Colleges (APUMDC) can conduct only two admission rounds and not three like before. Students who did not get seats in the two rounds are now seeking admission individually to the state's nine MBBS and 19 BDS private colleges.

Divya Sagar (name changed), a Mithibai College student, is planning to drop a year and try for the course next year. However, she is also worried about the difficulty level of National Eligibility cum Entrance Test, to be introduced from 2013. "One college claimed they have no vacant seats, but the association's list shows it has nearly 30 vacant seats. We will have to approach individual colleges in a week's time. I approached colleges in Khed, Jalgaon and Navi Mumbai but could not check with others as they had closed admissions."

Ajaz Rawoot, a parent, said, "After the two rounds, colleges had to issue advertisements or display vacancies on their website. Not many have followed the Pravesh Niyantran Samiti (PNS) rules. Colleges were supposed to give us time till September 21 for application and counselling but several closed admissions on September 18." Another student said she would have got a seat if there would have been a third round. She said colleges are claiming there are no seats and asking for donations.

APUMDC chairman Kamal Kishore Kadam said, "After the two rounds, the association had sent the procedures to be followed to all the members and a letter asking them to follow the SC verdict. If colleges fail to do it, it will amount to contempt. Students can approach the PNS or even the court."

"After the centralized process, colleges have to put up a merit list and get it approved by PNS. If students' ASSO-CET scores are higher than the cut-offs listed, they can approach the authorities," added Kadam.

Some students have approached Forum For Fairness in Education for help.

Those who could not secure a seat in two rounds have been seeking admission to institutes individually.

Record number of students take govt quota engineering seats in Tamil Nadu

Academics have predicted that at least 50,000 engineering seats in the government quota are likely to go vacant in 2012. They will probably be spot on, but more students are opting for government quota seats this year than ever before.

Officials in charge of the Tamil Nadu Engineering Admissions said that they expect 1.25 lakh seats to be filled through the single window counselling system this year, the most since the process was introduced in 1997.

Till Friday, 1,17,507 candidates were allotted seats through the government quota, compared to 1.04 lakh students in 2011 and 1.1 lakh students in 2010.

Higher education experts said the large number was not a pointer to a sudden surge in demand for engineering seats. "It is just that more students have more confidence in single window counselling. There is greater awareness of the benefits of securing admission through the system," said professor Rhymend Uthariaraj, secretary of Tamil Nadu Engineering Admissions (TNEA).

Many students opted for admission through single window counselling because the tuition fee for those opting for management seats was much higher than the fee that students have to pay if they take government quota seats. The tuition fee students who take a non-accredited BE or BTech government quota seat is set at 40,000, while an accredited course costs 45,000 under the government quota. The tuition fee of a management course has been set at 70,000.

Another reason why students are choosing government quota seats is that banks are refusing to offer education loans to students for management seats. Students said from this year banks have started to demand proof that the student has opted for a government quota seat.

Many students hope to be able to pay for their course through an education loan, said education consultant Jayaprakash Gandhi. "They have been forced to opt for a government quota seat even if the college is not their first choice," he said. But students still have a choice of colleges.

"Many groups have three or five colleges and between 500 and 1,500 vacant seats," Gandhi said. "Quality matters and students are making more informed choices."

More than 50% of the students who applied to take part in the single window counselling system were first generation graduates, for whom the government had ordered full tuition fee waiver.

Academics expect 1.25 lakh seats to be filled by August 22, when the month-long engineering counselling ends on Saturday. After that the TNEA will conduct phase 2 of the vocational counselling on August 19 and 20. This will be followed by supplementary counselling on August 21 for candidates who failed the Class 12 exam, wrote the supplementary exam and are eligible to take part in the counselling process. The counselling will close on August 22 when SC students will be allowed to take up unfilled seats reserved for SC Arunthathiar students.

Delhi University tries to make combined journalism entrance test transparent

The journalism faculty in Delhi University is going all out to make the admission process more transparent and student-friendly this year. To begin with, the faculty has decided to show the answer keys of the combined journalism entrance test (CJET) to candidates soon after the exam is over so that candidates can identify any discrepancy. CJET has been scheduled on June 3 following which the answer keys will be uploaded for two days on the special website created for admission.

"We have decided to provide the answer keys online for 48 hours. If the candidates find any discrepancy, they can bring it to our notice. They will get grace marks if we find an error," said Tarjeet Sabharwal, convener, CJET 2012, and faculty member, Delhi College of Arts and Commerce. The candidates will have to inform the principal of the college which would be their test centre about the discrepancy during those two days who will forward the complaint to the dean of faculty of applied social sciences, she added.

BA (honours) journalism is offered in five DU colleges - Delhi College of Arts and Commerce, Maharaja Agrasen College, Lady Shri Ram College, Kamala Nehru College and Kalindi College. Their individual journalism departments function under the aegis of the faculty of applied social sciences. This is the second year that all five colleges are holding a common entrance test for BA (honours) journalism.

The registration for CJET closed on May 18 and the faculty has received nearly 2,250 applications compared to 1,800 in 2011. There are 183 seats plus two seats for differently-abled candidates.

31,000 students in Indore to appear for All India Engineering Entrance Exam

About 31,000 students will appear for the 11th All India Engineering Entrance Exam (AIEEE) 2012 offline test to be held at around 51 different centres in the city on Sunday. Last year, nearly 26,000 students had appeared for the exam at 34 centres.

SK Joshi, city-coordinator of examination and principal of Vidyasagar School told ToI that after IIT-JEE, AIEEE is the most popular exam in the country. "In the past 10 years, the number of students appearing for AIEEE has increased manifold. We had started with five centres in the city. This year, there will be more than 50 centres in the city," added Joshi.

Country-wide, close to 11 lakh aspirants are expected to appear for the exam that is regarded as the gateway to 30 National Institutes of Technology (NITs) besides five Indian Institutes of Information Technology (IITs), central- and state-funded institutions and self-financed deemed universities and other institutions. Indore is one of the five cities in the state where the offline exam will be conducted by the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE). The exam will be conducted simultaneously in 63 different cities across the country.

However, Indore does not figure among the list of cities where online exam will be conducted. This year 11 lakh students will appear for the AIEEE, which is 50,000 more than last year. More institutions are expected to admit students through AIEEE. A decision in this regard will be taken by the CCB, which will be constituted by HRD ministry, and a list of tentative institutions joining the CCB will be placed on the website: www.ccb.nic.in.

The entrance examination features two papers - Paper-I consisting of three parts of Physics, Chemistry and Mathematics of equal weightage with objective type questions for B.E/B.Tech courses and Paper-II consisting of Mathematics, Aptitude Test and Drawing for B Arch and B Planning. The aptitude test is designed to evaluate candidate's perception, imagination, observation, creativity and architectural awareness.

500 apply online for PhD entrance test

Nearly 500 candidates have registered themselves online for the PhD entrance test to be organized on April 29. Monday was the last day for filling up the applications forms online for the test.

Officials said that the candidates have registered themselves for doctoral research in engineering, pharmacy, MBA and MCA subjects.

There are nine branches in engineering in which students can pursue their PhD thesis. The GTU has also identified branches in pharmacy and management where students can pursue research.

Last year, exam forms of 200 students were withheld as they had attendance less than what is mandated by the GTU. Later, the GTU had offered the students an option to submit a study paper and make up for attendance shortage.

GTU officials said that this year, the students will be offered no grace and will have to attend the mandated classes.

Over 79,410 students cleared MBA entrance in state

The results of Maharashtra's last MBA entrance exam conducted by Directorate of Technical Education (DTE) on March 11 are out and over 79,410 students have managed to clear it. State technical education director Subhash Mahajan told TOI from Mumbai that about 82,764 students actually appeared for the examination of which 3,354 were disqualified on various counts. Those clearing the exam would fight it out for nearly 34,000 seats available in over 400 colleges across the state. From Nagpur division comprising six districts, 9,226 candidates had registered for this year's exam of which over 8,000 actually appeared at three centres. But in comparison to 2010 where 11,600 had appeared, and 2009 where over 19,000 had taken this exam, this year's number was still less. According to DTE officials, the MAH-MBA/MMS-CET was conducted across 21 centres in the division of which, 19 were in Nagpur while one each was allocated to Bhandara and Chandrapur. A total of 5,490 seats are up for grabs in 60 colleges across the division. Last year however, about 2,677 seats remained vacant which led to institutions going into bankruptcy. The entrance was originally scheduled for February 26 but since its dates were clashing with All India Council for Technical Education's (AICTE) Common Management Aptitude Test (CMAT), it was postponed. A majority of colleges from the division have stated that they will also accept CMAT scores for admission. The Maharashtra government had already granted approval for the CMAT which means this will be last MAH-MBA/MMS-CET to be conducted by the DTE. The exam is conducted for admissions into courses offered in government, university managed, university departments and unaided institutes in the state. However, the official expressed concern over fading popularity of management courses in the state. Though the number of MBA seats is increasing every year, the colleges are facing students' crunch, especially the new ones. Even in the 2010-11 session, over 5,000 MBA seats remained vacant all over the state. Schedule for MAH-MBA/MMS-CET-2012 * Registration for GD/PI & receipt of call letter- April 19 to 30 * Conduct of GD/PI at select centres - May 10 to 31 * Submission of work experience certificate - May 10 to 21 * Document verification at various ARCs - May 10 to 31 * Display of provisional merit list on website - June 16 at 5pm * Submission of grievance applications - June 18 to 19 * Display of final merit list on website - June 25 at 5pm MBA CET students' stats: Appeared - 82,764 Passed - 79,410 Disqualified - 3,354

Last Minute Tips

As engineering aspirants across the country gear up for IIT-JEE on April 8, We offer some last-minute tips on how to crack the test

With over five lakh students expected to appear for the IIT joint entrance exam this year, the competition is going to be tough. So how do you prepare yourself for a stellar performance?

Right Revision

Says Shubham Mehta, who secured a second rank at the IIT-JEE 2011, "Though you should try and keep in touch with every topic, the focus at this stage should be on organic and inorganic chemistry. Mathematics and physics are conceptual and devoting as less as an hour or two to these subjects every day should be fine. Make short notes and highlights of chapters, concepts and formulas." Mihir Patel, a fourth year electrical engineering student at IIT Bombay, adds that this is the time to revise the complete syllabus starting with concepts you understand relatively well. "Don't leave any topic. Compile your frequent errors; understand why they occur and come up with strategies to avoid them," he says. Additionally, solving a few problems from your notes, study material and last year's JEE paper will be of help. Pay equal attention to all the three subjects by devoting specific hours during the day or entire days for each of the subjects. Make mental clues of all your concepts so as to help you retrieve them quickly during the exam. You may also revise chapters from your class XI books to brush up on various concepts.

Exam Time

IIT-JEE is a competitive exam and includes both easy and tough questions. So if you find a question difficult, remember a majority of students would feel the same. Advises Mehta, "Keep the order of the subjects you are attempting the same as the one you are used to attempting at your coaching class/practice hours. This will ensure that your mind is at ease during the exam. Don't spend more than five minutes on any particular problem. Try to complete the chemistry section within 30-45 minutes, physics within 45 minutes to an hour and the mathematics section within an hour-and-a-half ."

Says Tejas Shyam, a fifth year metallurgical engineering and materials science student at IIT-B , "If you feel comfortable, solve the questions that carry more marks first (even among the problems you find easy). This will maximise your attempt. Do not try too much of guesswork, lest you garner negative marks."

Subject-Wise

Maths:

Draw diagrams especially in co-ordinate and Calculus related questions . Focus on quadratic equations and expressions, complex numbers, probability, vectors, matrices in algebra; circle, parabola, hyperbola in co-ordinate geometry, etc. Use method of substitution and elimination in trigonometry and conic sections if you don't know the correct way. Try deriving all the important properties of conic sections without consulting a reference and make a comparison table to refer to on the last day. Try deriving the derivatives and integrals without consulting the reference

Physics: 

Most of the concepts here are intuitive and difficult to forget. Follow the concept until the end. Revise modern physics, mechanics, fluids, heat and thermodynamics, waves and sound, capacitors and electrostatics, magnetics, electromagnetic induction and optics thoroughly. Avoid lengthy questions

Chemistry: 

Organic and inorganic chemistry: In inorganic chemistry, focus on qualitative analysis, co-ordination chemistry and chemical bonding. Make a mapping between name of the reaction, species/ functional groups that occur as reactants and those that occur as product , catalysts and reaction conditions. Understand the arrow mechanisms. In physical chemistry, pay attention to electro-chemistry , thermodynamics and chemical equilibrium. Beware of calculation errors Questions with no negative marking must be attempted. Mark the answers on the OMR sheet after every four to five attempted questions. Remember, JEE is about quality and not quantity. You can make the cut by performing well in at least two subjects and securing the minimum cut-off marks in one.

Mental Make-Up

You have done the best you could, now is the time to be confident and calm. Don't stress over what you don't know, but be sure of what you do.

Remember to go for regular walks or get at least an hourlong exercise each day to refresh your mind. Advises Gautam Barua, director, IIT-Guwahati : "Do not listen to anybody other than your inner self. Be confident of your abilities and don't get distracted by random advice about the pattern of questions or the likely questions. Give it your best shot and be satisfied with it."

IGNOU Online Entrance Exams

The Indira Gandhi National Open University's (IGNOU's) Chair for Sustainable Development (CSD) announces admission for three online programmes - leadership programme on nutrition security and sustainable development (LPNSSD), appreciation programme on sustainable management of Ganga- a scientific approach (APSMG) and leadership programme on Himalayan ecosystems (LPHECO).

The objective of these programmes is to sensitise the policy makers, administrators, scientists and other stakeholders in the emerging discipline of sustainability science.

Their eligibility is a graduation degree in any subject. Postgraduate students, researchers, scientists, engineers, medical doctors, stake holders, policy makers, administrators and other professionals with requisite educational qualifications will be given preference.

These online platform courses that are available on Sustainability Action and Virtual Education (SAVE) offer a complete virtual learning environment suite covering all activities from registration to certification. It consists of integrated multimedia courseware, online counseling and mentoring, 24 x 7 learner support; group based online seminar, online project platform and online term end examination.

The programme duration for APSMG is minimum one and a half months and maximum eight months while that for LPNSSD and LPHECO is minimum one month and maximum six months.

Last date for submission of application forms is April 15.

www.ignou.ac.in

IITs want say in new test format

The Indian Institutes of Technology want a say in the new entrance examination that the Centre has proposed to replace the IIT-Joint Entrance Examination in 2013.

While members of the senate of IIT-Kanpur and IIT-Delhi have written to the HRD ministry asking that their suggestions be taken into consideration, the IIT-Madras Faculty Association has sent its views to other IITs to express solidarity on the issue. Some of these academics say they understand the intentions for the change, but charge the ministry with rushing through with the change without considering the views of stakeholders.

"We were never consulted on the proposed change. We are for the inclusion of higher secondary marks in the admission process and feel that the marking formula proposed by the Indian Statistical Institute is fair. But why is the ministry in such a hurry to start the new test in 2013 without looking into the pros and cons?" asked S K Das, president of the IIT-Madras Faculty Association. "We agree the system must be modified and want to provide suggestions on how best to make the change. The ISEET proposal is sketchy and nothing has been documented. Whatever we know is through a presentation and from media," said chairman of the board of governors of IIT Kanpur M Anandakrishnan.

India to roll out common entrance medical exam from 2013

It's now official - the common National Eligibility-cum-Entrance Test (NEET) for admission to Under Graduate (UG) will be conducted by the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) while it will be the National Board of Examination that will conduct the Post Graduate (PG) exams.

India is all set to roll out NEET from 2013-14.

Putting ghosts to rest, the Union health ministry has informed state governments that their existing reservation policies would not be disturbed under the proposed scheme and state wise eligibility merit lists will be prepared for the respective state authorities to admit students for admission in accordance with their admission criteria in the institutions located in the respective states.

The Medical Council of India has also revised the syllabus for NEET-UG.

The qualifying criterion has been changed from percentage of absolute marks to percentile to ensure that no seat remains unfilled. Ghulam Nabi Azad said on Monday "A few state governments had expressed concerns about the proposed NEET particularly with regard to the syllabus for the NEET for UG, reservation of seats, medium of examination, as well as their own preparedness to introduce the scheme from the academic year 2012-13 and whether once introduced some of their seats would go unfilled because of high merit. The government has addressed all the concerns."

The ministry has also set up a coordination Committee "with all relevant stakeholders as members, which will address any issue relating to the admission process, including regional language as medium for conduct of NEET."

NEET would mean a single entrance examination will be held for MBBS and MD courses offered by all 271 medical colleges, 138 run by governments and 133 under private management. These colleges offer over 31,000 seats for MBBS courses and another 11,000 seats for PG degrees.

Experts say NEET would reduce hassles for students appearing for multiple medical exams.

"Once implemented, the NEET would be applicable to all medical colleges which come under the ambit of MCI, including private medical colleges," Azad said.

Among the states that was against the introduction of NEET in 2012 included West Bengal Maharashtra, Assam, Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka. Maharashtra, Gujarat and Goa had showed readiness to join NEET from 2013-14 but AP sought exemption for two years, saying it would join from 2014-15.

"At present, about 17 entrance tests are held to fill 32,000 UG seats in medical colleges across the country," a ministry official said.

GMAT Mock Test 2012

The Graduate Management Aptitude Test (GMAT) is needed for admission to an MBA programme or a business-related field such as finance. More than 4,800 programmes offered by more than 1,500 institutions in 83 countries use the GMAT as part of the selection criteria for their programmes. In order to be eligible to receive GMAT scores, an institution must be a degree-granting institution that offers graduate-level programmes in business and management. The institution must be accredited to grant degrees.
From June 2012, GMAT will add a section called 'Integrated Reasoning.' The need for this new section was a direct result of a worldwide survey of more than 740 business faculty in 2008. The section will provide additional information to admission officers to help make sound decisions in a highly competitive market for the best candidates.

For more questions on Integrated Reasoning, visit http://bit.ly/wWnbL7

Over 12 lakh students appear in GATE examination

Over 12 lakh GATE aspirants took the examination on Sunday. The Graduate Aptitude Test in Engineering (GATE) is an all-India examination conducted jointly by theIndian Institute of Science (IISc), Bangalore and the seven Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) for admission to post graduate programs in engineering, technology, architecture and pharmacy at national level. 

GATE 2012 - morning session (9am-12 pm) Common GATE 2012 largely followed the pattern of last year's paper, as previously announced in the GATE 2012 prospectus. The paper consisted of 65 questions with a maximum score of 100 marks. The questions were MCQ type with four options. Every wrong answer incurred a negative marking of 1/3. 
The question-wise breakup of the paper was - engineering mathematics: 15 marks; general aptitude (verbal ability and numerical ability): 15 marks; core engineering subjects: 70 marks. 

However, this year cut-offs are likely to be slightly higher for both the papers (keeping in view the large number of students appearing in GATE 2012).Overall, it was a scoring paper for students with strong fundamentals. 

CS / IT - Analysis in general, this paper was slightly tougher as compared to GATE 2011. A majority of the questions were from DBMS and data structure and algorithm and computer network whereas very few questions were seen from compiler design. Surprisingly, there were no questions from software engineering. In terms of the difficulty level, questions from TOC and DMGT were the toughest and questions on DBMS and data structure were the easiest. 

GATE 2012 saw the weight-age allotted to computer networks increase from 6% to 13%, while the weight-age allotted to computer organisation decreased from 16% to 3% as compared to last year. There was very change in the weight-age of subjects like maths, compiler design and digital. 

Mechanical Engineering - Analysis In general, the difficulty level of this paper was similar to that of the last year. GATE 2012 saw the weight-age allotted to manufacturing and production engineering increase from 12 % to 16%, while the weight-age allotted to thermodynamics decreased from 19% to 13%. There was very little change in the weight-age of subjects like maths, general aptitude and applied mechanics and design. 

About 21% questions were from manufacturing section whereas very few questions were seen from thermal science which includes thermodynamics, fluid mechanics and heat transfer. In terms of the difficulty level, questions from mechanics and design were the toughest.