Decoding the new JEE
Your chances of getting into the IITs and other top engineering colleges just got brighter. Read on to find out how!

By The Career Choices Team
Starting 2013, a single entrance exam replaces the IIT-JEE, AIEEE, BITSAT and many others - to become the sole entrance exam for admission to centrally-funded engineering institutes such as the 15 IITs, IT-BHU, ISMU Dhanbad, 30 NITs, 4 IIITs, IISERs and a few deemed universities. Re-christened the Indian Science Engineering Eligibility Test (ISEET), this exam is all set to revolutionise the way we select students for engineering college.

What’s Changed?
If entrance exams were earlier all about PCM, the new pattern introduces aptitude-based questions and brings back attention to Board exam marks. The new JEE/ISEET will have two papers: the JEE/ISEET Main, a paper that tests students on aptitude based questions and the JEE/ISEET Advance that will test students on problems based on the application of Physics, Chemistry and Maths. These two papers will have a weightage of 30% each - with a total maximum weightage 60%. The remaining 40% weightage will be allotted to board exam marks.

The new JEE/ISEET pattern is designed to test students on all that makes an engineering student – memory, comprehension, application skills, and aptitude. Complex problem-solving skills are what an engineering student will develop when in college, and hence, these cease to play a decisive role in the selection process in this new JEE/ISEET pattern.

Questions in the Board exams are designed to test students on their memory as well as basic comprehension skills. The current AIEEE pattern tests takes up from the level of questions in the Boards. Here, questions are designed to test students on higher-level comprehension (as compared to the Boards) and application skills. However, they do not reach the level of problem solving skills that are appear in the IIT-JEE. Notorious for being one of the most toughest and competitive exams in the world, the IIT-JEE tests students on the highest-order problem solving skills. The new JEE/ISEET pattern is designed to strike a fine balance between these different levels to make up the anatomy of the perfect engineering student - balancing hard work, aptitude, and subject knowledge.

This means that with the new JEE/ISEET, students with different skills and ability are no longer ill-suited to the exam. In fact, they are now in a better position than those who possess only ‘academic’ skills.

REAL-WORLD IMPACT
The time when only a ‘great’ or ‘scholarly’ student went to the IITs or NITs is over. With the weightage allotted to different areas of assessment for selection to these colleges, one does not have to rely on deep knowledge of advanced PCM problems to make it through. Here’s a look at the marks of students in the areas covered in the new format, based on their current performance level and preparation strategy.
Previously, the ‘great student’ would have focused completely on the entrance exam, giving the ‘good’ students an edge in the Board exams. In the Advance section (PCM) the ‘great’ student outperforms the others by a mile. (The newly introduced aptitude section is untested, so we have awarded them similar marks as it is yet to be seen how they may perform in this section) The new pattern blurs the vast difference in marks that makes a student ‘great’, ‘good’, or average’. The previously ‘good’ or ‘average’ student can now turn the game around by scoring well in the XII Boards or in the aptitude (Main) section. Imagine, if in this format, the ‘good’ or ‘average’ student were to prepare hard for the aptitude section and score better marks! His total would then be higher than the ‘great’ student!

Let us look at an actual situation from 2011 where two students, Ravi and Kunal (names changed to protect identities) performed well in the Boards. Ravi preferred complex PCM problems relevant to engineering entrance, and as a result, scored well in the AIEEE. Kunal got a lower score in the AIEEE because he concentrated more on the Boards and did not devote much time to solving problems more likely to appear in the AIEEE. As a result, his chances of getting into a top engineering college drastically went down. The fact that Kunal’s performance in the Board exams was comparable to Ravi's did not matter.

However, in the new JEE, due weight is given to performance in XII - along with aptitude. This creates a level playing field for students who now have to balance their preparation. Someone like Kunal can now succeed if he does well in the Main section.

What this means: The new JEE is good news for the student who had been written off by the old format. By shifting focus to the Boards and the aptitude section, students who focus on school studies can now get a higher rank than before and stand a good chance of getting into a top engineering college.

THE PLAN CHANGES
While the JEE/ISEET allots a weight-age of 40-30-30 to the Board exams, the Aptitude section (Main), and PCM section (Advance), the actual picture is different.

On evaluating all the information available on the new pattern, the 50-30-10 weight-age follows logically. Consider this:

Out of the 30% weight-age given to Advanced (PCM):

• 1/3rd is mandated for Board- level questions. So, that is effectively covered in your XII
  preparation
  
• 1/3rd comprises of extremely difficult questions, successfully attempted by less than 1% of the students. So, for all practical purposes, it does not count
  
• This renders only 1/3rd of the advanced section as ‘do-able’. What this means: Engineering entrance exams have changed and now it's time you too changed the way you prepare. Your performance in the Board exams and JEE Aptitude section will make all the difference so make sure you invest a proportionate chunk of your preparation time to these crucial sections.