CAT 2011 Exam Pattern Changed - IIM Calcutta
with just three months to go and with students coming up with strategies, IIM C, which will conduct CAT 2011 has come up with an announcement... THE PATTERN HAS BEEN CHANGED!!!
IIM Calcutta has officially announced CAT 2011, the entrance exam for the 13 IIMs and over 150 B-schools in India. CAT 2011 will be held in a 20 day window between October 22, 2011 and November 18, 2011. The news of the CAT 2011 dates was broken by MBAUniverse.com on Saturday, July 23, 2011. Prometric, the agency which has conducted the computer based CAT since CAT 2009 will continue to be the test developer and deliver CAT 2011 as well. The details will be updated in the official CAT website, #-Link-Snipped-# from Monday, August 8, 2011 onwards.
According to IIM Calcutta, there will be some changes in the pattern of the paper. CAT 2011 will have only two sections instead of the erstwhile three sections. The first section will focus on Quantitative Ability & Data Interpretation; the second on Verbal Ability & Logical Reasoning. There will be total 60 questions in the paper, 30 in each section. The duration of CAT 2011 will be 140 minutes.
These two sections will be implemented sequentially with separate time limits. The examination will be for 140 minutes. Candidates will have 70 minutes to answer 30 questions within each section which will have an on-screen countdown timer. Once the time ends for the first section, they will move to the second and will no longer be able to go back. Although new in the computer-based version of CAT, this format was previously practiced in some of the earlier paper-and-pencil years. Hence the candidates will have to really careful about the time management of the two sections.
Before the test, a 15 minute tutorial will be provided and candidates are advised to go through that carefully before starting the actual CAT 2011 exam. The total duration will be two hours and 35 minutes including the tutorial.
To make the candidates familiar with the new pattern of the timed sections as well as navigation and functionality of the test, a practice test will be made available to the candidates in the coming weeks.
CAT Convener, Prof. Janakriraman Moorthy of IIM Calcutta said, “We are confident that CAT 2011 is going to help us in identifying the appropriate candidates for our programs, and that the examination will be fair and equitable.†Prof. Moorthy also added, “Considerable effort has been invested in maintaining similar level of difficulty across papers. A small number of statistically and psychometrically validated questions are randomly inserted in each question paper as equating blocks. These will be used for establishing post test equality across the days.â€
During the test days of CAT 2011, the check-in procedure will start one-and-a-half hours before the scheduled test time instead of two hours which was for CAT 2010. “With this change, we are also able to have an earlier start time of 3:15pm for the afternoon session,†said Prof. Moorthy.
Three new cities – Bhilai, Jammu and Dehradun have been added to the previous 33 test locations. According to IIM Calcutta, this will help in bringing CAT closer to the northern states of the country. The number of Axis Bank outlets, from where the CAT Vouchers are sold has also been increased. CAT 2011 Vouchers will be sold in 201 branches of Axis Bank across India, an increase of 30 outlets compared to CAT 2010.
A video on the conversion of CAT to a computer-based test and candidate impressions of this transition will be available on YouTube by the end of this week.
SOURCE: CAT 2011 Exam Date: It's official now! CAT 2011 from Oct 22 to Nov 18; changes in exam pattern
Wonder what the reactions from the test takers is to be... well mine was a heart attack! 😉
IIM Calcutta has officially announced CAT 2011, the entrance exam for the 13 IIMs and over 150 B-schools in India. CAT 2011 will be held in a 20 day window between October 22, 2011 and November 18, 2011. The news of the CAT 2011 dates was broken by MBAUniverse.com on Saturday, July 23, 2011. Prometric, the agency which has conducted the computer based CAT since CAT 2009 will continue to be the test developer and deliver CAT 2011 as well. The details will be updated in the official CAT website, #-Link-Snipped-# from Monday, August 8, 2011 onwards.
According to IIM Calcutta, there will be some changes in the pattern of the paper. CAT 2011 will have only two sections instead of the erstwhile three sections. The first section will focus on Quantitative Ability & Data Interpretation; the second on Verbal Ability & Logical Reasoning. There will be total 60 questions in the paper, 30 in each section. The duration of CAT 2011 will be 140 minutes.
These two sections will be implemented sequentially with separate time limits. The examination will be for 140 minutes. Candidates will have 70 minutes to answer 30 questions within each section which will have an on-screen countdown timer. Once the time ends for the first section, they will move to the second and will no longer be able to go back. Although new in the computer-based version of CAT, this format was previously practiced in some of the earlier paper-and-pencil years. Hence the candidates will have to really careful about the time management of the two sections.
Before the test, a 15 minute tutorial will be provided and candidates are advised to go through that carefully before starting the actual CAT 2011 exam. The total duration will be two hours and 35 minutes including the tutorial.
To make the candidates familiar with the new pattern of the timed sections as well as navigation and functionality of the test, a practice test will be made available to the candidates in the coming weeks.
CAT Convener, Prof. Janakriraman Moorthy of IIM Calcutta said, “We are confident that CAT 2011 is going to help us in identifying the appropriate candidates for our programs, and that the examination will be fair and equitable.†Prof. Moorthy also added, “Considerable effort has been invested in maintaining similar level of difficulty across papers. A small number of statistically and psychometrically validated questions are randomly inserted in each question paper as equating blocks. These will be used for establishing post test equality across the days.â€
During the test days of CAT 2011, the check-in procedure will start one-and-a-half hours before the scheduled test time instead of two hours which was for CAT 2010. “With this change, we are also able to have an earlier start time of 3:15pm for the afternoon session,†said Prof. Moorthy.
Three new cities – Bhilai, Jammu and Dehradun have been added to the previous 33 test locations. According to IIM Calcutta, this will help in bringing CAT closer to the northern states of the country. The number of Axis Bank outlets, from where the CAT Vouchers are sold has also been increased. CAT 2011 Vouchers will be sold in 201 branches of Axis Bank across India, an increase of 30 outlets compared to CAT 2010.
A video on the conversion of CAT to a computer-based test and candidate impressions of this transition will be available on YouTube by the end of this week.
SOURCE: CAT 2011 Exam Date: It's official now! CAT 2011 from Oct 22 to Nov 18; changes in exam pattern
Wonder what the reactions from the test takers is to be... well mine was a heart attack! 😉
Replies
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Ankita KatdareWhy did they change it so suddenly? Wasn't there a prior notice about this? -
cooltwinsNo not even the slightest sign of it... It was announced few minutes back.
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Saandeep Sreerambatla30 questions and 70 mins, this time its going to be very tuff .
I love the concept of separate sections, but Aptitude + DI Verbal + reasoning is another.
SO, first one takes lot of time and second one takes less time.
So, all aspirants now time is going to be very very critical.. Make sure that you are good at both speed and accuracy!! -
Ankita KatdareOk so what I know now is :
Only two sections instead of three.
The first section : Quantitative Ability & Data Interpretation
The second section : Verbal Ability & Logical Reasoning.
The examination will be 140 minutes. Candidates will have 70 minutes to answer 30 questions within each section which will have an on-screen countdown timer.
Once the time ends for the first section, they will move to the second and will not be able to go back.
What is the reason behind making this pattern change?
The reason I have made two sections is because students spend a lot of time on one section and thereby lose out on other sections. By making it two sections, candidates will concentrate more or less on one section for a longer time.
I guess this is a good news for people who are not that good in verbal ability. What say? -
silverscorpionI think this might actually prove to be bad news for people who are good in verbal.
If you are very good in verbal, you can finish that section in some 50 minutes.. As you're not going to answer all the questions, based on the difficulty of the paper, you can answer as many as possible.
But in any case, if you're not very bad in verbal ability, it should not take more than 50-55 mins.
If you can go back and forth between sections, then you can save some 10 minutes in verbal and use that for some additional questions in quants.
Now, sadly, that is not possible. I think this move is taken to ensure that people spend equal time in all areas of the paper. -
Ankita KatdareTop experts are welcoming the change in CAT 2011 exam pattern. This new pattern does necessitate a change in strategy for those students who used to allocate extra time to the sections where they felt they could score well.
The change means that you will need to be strong in both the two sections as defined. The change also takes away the decision making aspect with respect to time allocation to some extent.
On the other hand, it might actually benefit those who were struggling to clear a particular sectional cut-offs even though they did well on an overall basis. For example, some students consistently fall short of the sectional cut-off for Quant, but score well in the paper as a whole. The fact that the number of sections has been reduced by combining the earlier one means that even if you are weak in say, Quant, you can make up by doing well in DI and thus clearing the sectional cut-off. -
Kaustubh KatdareI agree with Silverscorpion.
I think this might actually prove to be bad news for people who are good in verbal.
Do you have any strategy which might work in favor of students?
If you are very good in verbal, you can finish that section in some 50 minutes.. As you're not going to answer all the questions, based on the difficulty of the paper, you can answer as many as possible.
But in any case, if you're not very bad in verbal ability, it should not take more than 50-55 mins. -
cooltwinsyeah it is a bad news for those who are good in verbals becuse for some one who is good in verbals more than 40 minutes is excess. also the section that has been attached with it i.e., the logical reasoning is a really easy section too. so on the whole 70 minutes is excess for this section.and one can look forward to more analytical question here like the ones from XAT and GMAT. but this is going to be a scoring section.
now looking at the first section: Quants, no matter how much time is given it is never enough for quants and the Di section is actually a very easy one but a time consuming one. so the 70 minutes given here is not going to be sufficient.
by this pattern they send out only one message to the CAT takers: speed and accuracy is of prime importance when it comes to cracking CAT. so students must gear up their preps and focus on improving speed and accuracy.
but this pattern does have some seriously good benefits (espicially for those who struggle with verbals or quants) as the weightage on verbals and quants has been lifted off (at least partially). and yeah lesser sectional cut offs to bother about 😛
Also this pattern does remove the tension of descision making with respect to time so thats another bonus 😛
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