CAT 2014 is claimed to be going to more ‘aspirants friendly’ than any earlier CAT years. CAT the most sought after MBA/PGDM entrance tests with approximately 2 lakhs of registrations for the exam every year, saw a difficult situation in 2013 when number of candidates scoring ‘Zero’ marks got a good positive percentile. On the top of it many candidates scoring marks in negative also scored some positive percentile.
CAT 2013 had an ironical situation
It was an ironical situation which raised many eye brows and called for review of the scoring pattern. Thousands of candidates as well as educators, CAT experts were not satisfied with the scoring and equating system and this led to filing of Court cases against the CAT 2013 convening IIM Indore.
Criticism of CAT 2013 had the ground
CAT 2013 was criticized on the ground that it had varying difficulty level on different days and different sessions. The criteria to normalize the scores was not clear and this created dissatisfaction among the aspirants when they found that even those who scored ‘zero’ marks and negative marks were able to score positive percentile. CAT 2014 aims to eliminate all such speculative thought process and is set to bring more transparency in scoring, equating and normalization process.
What went wrong
Let us know what went wrong in the process in CAT 2013 that caused so much resentment
CAT 2013 was conducted over a period of 20 days in 40 sessions which consequently had varying standards of difficulty. The level of difficulty was different for each session of each day of the testing period. The petition filed in the court stated that the method of 'equating', 'scaling' and 'normalization' used by the concerned in the process of scoring in CAT 2013 to normalize the scores was unlawful and erroneous.
According to the petition the process of normalization, known as equating and scaling, had serious irregularities in the scores awarded to the aspirants. The irony was that candidates who did not attempt even a single question were awarded a percentile of 50+. Now it implies that more than 50% of the 1.7 lakh candidates who took CAT 2013 scored zero or even marks in negative.
The example of a candidate was cited. He did not attempt any question in either of the sections of the paper in CAT 2013. Still he scored an overall score of 165 out of 450 marks and an overall percentile of 55.46 which is not correct going by the high standards of CAT.
Exercise to make CAT 2014 transparent
Alarmed with the emerging adverse impact of the CAT 2013, IIMs have decided to conduct CAT 2014 in shorter testing window consisting only 4 sessions as against 40 sessions in CAT 2013; increase the number of test cities from 40 in CAT 2013 to 99 in CAT 2014; increase number of questions from 60 to 100; increase total time to solve the exam from 140 minutes to 170 minutes; remove restriction of moving from one section to another during the test duration.
CAT 2014 proposes to bring more transparency, avoid confusion on testing days and to bring forth a transparent system of scoring/equating so that it is well understood by the aspirants before going to take the test.
CAT 2014:EQUATING/SCORING METHOD
Keeping all these problems of CAT 2013 in mind, CAT 2014 proposes to bring out a series of changes in scoring/equating process in CAT 2014 and will publish them on its site before the examination.
Expected changes in CAT 2014
The alarm that rang throughout the system proposes to set the process right. To bring more transparency in the process CAT 2014 publication states “The Equating/Scaling Process will be announced on the CAT 2014 website: www.iimcat.ac.in prior to CAT 2014 examination (16th and 22nd November, 2014)” Now the candidates will have the first hand acquaintance with the exact scoring, equating and scaling system before CAT 2014 begins.
Impact of changes announced so far
The changes announced so far are expected to have positive impact as follows-
• With the announcement of shorter testing window, there shouldn’t be any misgiving on normalization of scores and scaling. The same could be equated accurately in a shorter time period.
• CAT 2014 convening IIM Indore is keeping a close watch and monitoring all the test related activities including the process being undertaken by the test partner TCS so that nothing should be miscalculated.
• The lowest threshold scoring of raw marks beyond which no consideration would be given for scaling and scoring might be fixed. This will enable the candidates to get scores in right perspective.
• The process will be published before the test and the aspirants should well understand Scoring, Scaling and Equating process and accordingly devise the strategy to attempt the CAT 2014
A Welcome move
Any concealment in the selection process in CAT, however free and fair, causes confusion and raises questions on the entire scoring and normalization process, called award of percentile. With such ironical situations CAT may lose its pristine glory. Hence it is a welcome move in CAT 2014 to publish the process for normalization of scores in CAT 2014 in public domain well before the test begins.
