The numbers of those taking the Common Admission Test (CAT) have increased in the past few years, and this does not comprise just the students; it includes the faculty of various coaching institutes too. The reasons the faculty take up the test are aplenty.
First, they gain first-hand information on the kind of questions that appear on the test. Second, they place themselves in the students’ shoes and check if the test was tough or easy. Several coaching centres encourage their faculty to appear for the test as this will help them frame a better syllabus for the next year.
“It is quite common for people from the industry to take up the test to keep abreast of the question trends,” said Vinayak Kudva, product head, IMS Learning Resource. Kudva, too, appeared for the CAT exam. Seconding his opinion, Ajay Arora, director of TIME, said that a few faculty members from major cities appeared for the exam.“There are some young faculty members, who are serious about their future, but there are others who take up the test for their own advantage,” he added.
Non-engineers benefit
The change in format was beneficial tonon-engineering candidates. “Those from an engineering background find the Verbal Ability section tough, but with the new combined format, they had an option to leave that out and score in logical reasoning,” Arora said. CAT has been made easier for aspirants.
“Now there is no cut-off on the number of attempts by a candidate,” said Janakiraman Moorthy, convenor of CAT 2011 from IIM- Calcutta.
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