Chennai: The myth that only students who study in coaching centres for IIT-JEE crack the exam successfully was busted this year.
Of the 27,162 who cleared JEE (advanced), as many as 14,282 (about 53 per cent) claimed that they had studied on their own to take up the exam.
The Madras zone - including Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Karnataka - remained an exception with more students (3,576) clearing the test after undergoing special coaching in tuition centres.
“In the past, coaching centres used to teach students using previous years’ question papers but now students have found that coaching centres are not able to coach them for JEE (advanced) after we adopted the new pattern,” IIT Kanpur chairman Prof M. Anandakrishnan told DC on Friday.
Stressing that only students with good fundamental knowledge could clear JEE (advanced), he said this year’s trend could be seen as positive as students prepare for JEE through self-study mode.
“Even though students from the Madras zone have good fundamental knowledge, they lack self-confidence, which makes them go to coaching centres. This might change in the future and these students too will do self-study,” he said.
V. Ragul, a JEE aspirant, was of the opinion that coaching centres provide the extra mileage to students by conducting a number of mock tests, which would not be possible on self-study mode.
“If we go to a coaching centre, they will conduct numerous mock tests with several different patterns and this helps us prepare for exams in a better way,” he said.
