'New IIT JEE format is bad for students from small cities'

True to his style, Human Resource Development Minister Kapil Sibal has provoked a massive reaction with his game-changing decision to make IITs part of a common entrance test. The move has left many IITs sulking and aspiring students confused and worried. But what does the lucrative IIT coaching industry make of all this? [caption id=“attachment_332609” align=“alignleft” width=“380” caption=“Students in St Xaviers College, Mumbai. Reuters”]  [/caption] The multi-thousand crore industry has been experiencing a boom these past couple of years.   A 2008 estimate by the Associated Chambers of Commerce and Industry pegged the IIT and engineering college coaching industry at Rs 10,000 crore. In the last four years, the number of IITs has more than doubled – from 7 in 2007 to 15 now –and so too perhaps the size of the industry. The top three IIT rank holders this year were all from one coaching institute - Forum for IIT JEE (FIITJEE). Firstpost spoke to Kalyan Kumar, Director, FIITJEE about what he thinks of Sibal’s ‘one nation one test’ system and whether the coaching industry should take some of the blame for the deteriorating quality of students who make it to IIT. Excerpts from the interview What will your immediate challenges be in the light of the new pattern of selection into the IITs? The immediate challenge is to find out what exactly the changes are that will be implemented. There are several versions from the scrapping of JEE (joint entrance exam) to a two tier exam for JEE inclusive of board marks. For FIITJEE there won’t be any change in content and context of teaching. Our school integrated programs, in which FIITJEE teachers teach a FIITJEE batch in the school premises within the school timings taking care of both Board curriculum and IIT-JEE curriculum. In this program there is an integrated approach and as only one teacher is teaching the students, for all types of exams, there is no cross linking, conflict and everything gets done within the school timings. So after school hours are purely meant for self study. Many institutes in Kota will be affected because their pattern has been to ignore school completely and focus on coaching. The students take admission in schools but never attend them. Even if these students qualify JEE they are incomplete, lack confidence and are extremely shy. In Andhra, they teach them 12 to 14 hours a day. This kind of spoon feeding produces children who lack the necessary skills of self exploration and makes them dependent on teachers for everything. How do you perceive this change in selection process? When a change is made with a positive bent of mind it makes a system useful. This change has been made by only keeping the fact in mind that coaching classes must be closed. Sometimes I wonder that it is okay to make cigarette like ITC does, it’s okay to make alcoholic drinks like Kingfisher does, but it’s not okay to teach kids because the schools have failed to do their basic work. This system will again change. Board marks should only be a qualifying criteria (like it was, 60 per cent) and to be included in selection. A student in a small town goes to a school which is a government school. This student has the analytical skills, the thinking skill, the ability to deal with pressure but he is only weak in answering long essay type questions. This student will suffer in the new system. All the people who have made these changes in the name of ’educational reforms’ are no smarter than you or me. How do you see this impacting you? In terms of demand from students and your coaching techniques? Our integrated program is already a hit and I feel this program will sell more. We are the ones who envisioned this concept. We are the only institute to have approximately 31 schools in the integrated program. Others are copying us but unfortunately they do it without knowing its basic purpose or what can be enhanced over a normal classroom program. Do you for see any problems with this new pattern of selection? First problem is that it is totally against students from small cities and towns. Second, since CBSE results are declared only in the last week of May, by the time the IITs look into Board marks it will be end of June. Thirdly, their idea of normalizing scores of different boards is so stupid, I have started having serious concerns about the mental health of the people concerned. What factors would you say are responsible or have contributed to the fall in the quality of students entering IIT? When you have an exam with a very low level of questions and that too an objective based exam, it is impossible to get the true talent. One can always do guess work. Take any exam in which out of four options one is correct and mark any choice ‘ b’ for all questions, you will realize that without studying itself you can score decent marks. The paper should be made tougher and subjective based. Do you think the new system will improve the quality of students? Only if board exams marks don’t become the criteria and subjective exams are held. Including board exam marks will benefit metro-based students from high-end public schools who have a flair for writing. There is a perception that coaching institutes are partly responsible for the deterioration of the quality of students. Your comments. The number of students who take tuition for their school curriculum is four times larger than the ones who take entrance test coaching. If our schools can’t even prevent tuitions from happening for the very course they teach, you can figure out where the problem lies. In 2007, the IIT entrance exam was made entirely objective type.  Did this impact the number of students who enrolled for coaching? By how much?  The number of students entering coaching increases as rapidly as you change the pattern. So the coaching market is directly proportional to the confusion created by our esteemed HRD ministry and the absurdity of the new system.  In 2008, number of IITs went up from 7 to 15. How did this impact demand for coaching? How much of a jump did you see? The number of students entering coaching is as it is 10 times more than the seats in all IITs. So there was no jump in demand. What is the number enrolments for IITJEE 2013? What is the fee structure for an IITJEE coaching programme? Since the admission is still on so I can’t specify the number. Fee depend on institute, it’s reputation, results, quality and quantity of faculty. General Ranjeet for a two year program varies between Rs 1-2 lakh for two years.