Admissions 2015: The simple way to navigate the college admissions process

Come June, and SSC students anxiously await their results, before queing up to gain admission to FYJC. In the Mumbai metropolitan area (MMR) these admissions were taken online a few years ago. Despite the best of efforts by the education department, concerns are raised each year about the way these admissions are conducted. I believe that by and large, these concerns have less to do with system discrepancies and more with making mistakes while filling the online forms. I appeal to parents and children to carefully go through the information booklet provided for the purpose. Following are a few key areas in this admission process.

Filling of online form- Each student is supposed to fill the online form in two parts. Part I, which is currently available, is about the personal information of the student. Part II which is to be filled after the declaration of the SSC result, is very crucial as students have to give their college preferences.

Junior college preferences- There is a three-part process to indicate these preferences. In Part I, you have to arrange colleges in preferential sequence from the entire MMR area. In Part II, select colleges from any one zone as listed in the booklet, so that if you can’t be allotted any college from Part I based on your merit, then you may be allotted a college from Part II. In Part III you have to list colleges from any two wards/sectors from the zone selected in Part II, so that if you can’t be allotted any college from first two parts, then you may be allotted a college from Part III. This usually gives rise to confusion among students. You should note that the authorities will first try to allot those colleges to you which you listed in Part I only, contrary to whatever you may have heard from any source. Thus, attempts will be made to allot you the college you list as number one in Part I, subject to merit. There have been instances where schools told students to give their own junior college as Preference I, claiming that this is mandatory. Students must note that they are absolutely free to set their preference as they wish.

The admissions website has the details of all colleges in the MMR region. I appeal to students and parents not to select colleges whose cut-off scores for last year are higher than your scores this year. For instance, suppose college X had closed admissions at 90% last year. If you score 60% marks in the SSC this year, then putting down this college in your preference list is a waste- because the cut-off in this college will never come down to 60% from 90% in just one year. Rather choose colleges in which you have a better chance of admission.

Betterment- Students should also note that the betterment option is given only once during the entire process. Betterment means moving up in your preference list. If you have already got college no.1 as per your preference, then you don’t stand any chance of getting betterment. You should also note that if you fail to take admission in round 1 or 2 in the college already allotted to you, then you are out of the admissions procedure and not entitled to betterment.

Reservations- Students applying under various reservation quotas should first find out from the booklet whether they are eligible for a particular reservation as per the norms and have valid certificates for the same. In case you apply under a particular reservation category, which you are not entitled to do, admission will be rejected by the college even if your name appears in the merit list. You will then be considered in the open category for the next round and allotted a college as per your merit.

Students migrating from a board other than the Maharashtra state board- Such students should note that they have to get their original school leaving certificates countersigned overleaf by the concerned education inspector/education officer of the area.
While listing a particular college in the preference form, check whether that college offers the subject that you want to learn at +2 level. For instance, students seeking admission to arts with the aim of doing architecture after HSC will want to take mathematics as one of the subjects because that’s the requirement for architecture. If you list a college that doesn’t offer mathematics in the arts stream and are allotted the same, then you might face problems later on. So be careful about such things.

CA Vidyadhar Joshi
vice principal, junior college

VG Vaze college of arts, science and commerce,
Mulund, Mumbai.