2129 - New JEE format: right questions, wrong answers - The Hindu
June 8, 2012
Saaz Sakrikar
June 8, 2012
Saaz Sakrikar
Contrary to the HRD Ministry's plans, the new system will still
benefit the coaching centres even as it lowers standards
J.C. Chaudhry must be a worried man. He is the managing director of
Aakash Institute, which makes crores charging huge fees to coach
aspirants for the IIT- JEE (Joint Entrance Exam). And the Human Resource
Development Ministry has announced that there will be drastic changes
in the JEE from next year, which will make coaching classes redundant.
Is that why Mr. Chaudhry appeared on TV last week to say this was a
bonanza for coaching institutes who could now offer three different
courses each?
Under the new format, admissions to all Central government engineering
institutes will be through a common exam, scrapping the current system
of JEE for the IITs and the All India Engineering Entrance Exam (AIEEE)
for other institutes. A common merit list is to be prepared with an
unprecedented 40 per cent weightage for Class XII board examination
marks and 30 per cent each for two examinations — JEE Main and JEE
Advanced — to be held on the same day.
The Ministry claims its main intention is to reduce the stress of
multiple entrance exams on students. It should have asked students their
opinion. More than the difficulty of the exam, the stress associated
with the JEE is due to the huge imbalance between the number of seats
and aspirants. The proposal does nothing to change this. In fact, the
pressure now to do well in three exams is sure to increase stress.
Also, by keeping both exams on the same day, a random event — the
candidate falling ill, even a bus breaking down — can destroy a
student's future. Whereas previously there were options if one entrance
test went badly, the new system has an all-or-nothing feel to it. It's
no surprise that parents are thinking of taking the matter to court.
The Ministry also aims to re-vitalise school education by giving more
importance to the Class XII board examinations which, it feels, are
ignored by students.
Again, had it asked students it would have realised
why. Though nominally the syllabi for the board examinations and the
JEE are the same, board examination papers are based on memory-based
learning with easy, expected questions, while the JEE's focus is
conceptual with unexpected, challenging questions. No JEE question is
ever repeated.
Besides, most State board examinations are plagued by rampant copying
and question paper leaks, while the practical examinations are famously a
farce. The final issue with board examinations is normalisation. Even
though normalisation across the 42 boards in the country is
statistically possible, the vast differences in question styles and
marking schemes make such a comparison meaningless.
HRD Minister Kapil Sibal claimed on TV that he is proud that the
proposals have been passed without dissent. Perhaps the five IIT Senates
that have disagreed with these changes — with IIT-Kanpur threatening to
have its own exam — don't count as dissent.
A senior professor, speaking on the condition of anonymity, described
the move as an assault on the academic autonomy of the IITs — sacrosanct
in the IIT Act.
These changes, he said, had been pushed down the
throats of the IITs by the IIT Council. This is contrary to the IIT Act
which states that the Senates are the deciding bodies on all academic
matters. It is telling that the Council which approved these changes has
a majority of non-academics, while the Senates which rejected them
comprise IIT professors.
The Senates had proposed changes to the current system — including a
screening test followed by a subjective-style main test, giving detailed
reasons for this. The consultations of the Council with the Senates
were pure posturing, the senior professor said, since none of the
latters' proposals were considered.
The skewed rural-urban and poor-rich ratios among those entering IITs is
what bothers the faculty most, said another professor, attributing this
to coaching classes being out of reach for most poor and rural
students. The proposed changes, however, would do nothing to solve this
problem, he said; in fact they would increase dependence on coaching
classes.
Under the guise of “democratisation”, reducing stress and destroying the
coaching industry, the Ministry wishes to replace an efficient system
with one that keeps IITs just as “elite”, which lowers admission
standards by including board examination marks, which increases student
stress and finally, mints more money for the coaching industry. Surely
if all the true stakeholders — the IIT professors, students and teenaged
aspirants — can see this, there is no reason Mr. Sibal, a shrewd lawyer
and politician, cannot.
(Saaz Sarikar is a second year student at IIT-Bombay.)
