CAT 2015: Summing up in 1 day 2 sessions; still the test aspirant friendly- know how

The CAT 2015 convening IIM Ahmedabad, in testing partnership with TCS has announced that CAT 2015 will be a better and more aspirant friendly exam in 1 day 2 sessions test window on November 29, 2015. On the other hand it conveys that CAT exams with long duration were not so friendly for test takers or CAT 2015 will bring something unique for the test takers to make it more aspirant friendly.
With many changes in CAT 2015 the exam appears to be an outcome of a well thought of process and may prove to be more aspirant friendly than earlier CAT exams.

Travel time saved
CAT 2015 is going to be convened in 136 test cities and at 650 testing venues. This number is highest so far since CAT was computerized in 2009. Many such small cities that had never been the CAT test centres earlier have also been included to facilitate the CAT 2015 aspirants to take the test in their preferred test city.

CAT test takers earlier had to travel a long way and had to arrive at their testing city a night before. Now with more number of test cities and about twice testing venues than in CAT 2014, it is expected candidates may not need to travel to other distant cities and stay there overnight to take CAT 2015. The journey to test city may not involve more than one or two hours journey. It means that it would be only one day affair.
CAT 2015 takers may not expect traffic jams on Sunday which would otherwise be a problem on weekdays to arrive at the testing site.

Choice of 4 testing cities
Offering more to CAT 2015 aspirants, the registration form to the test provided the choice of 4 preferred testing cities out of 136. Prof Tathagata Bandyopadhyay Convener CAT 2015 and faculty IIM Ahmedabad has also made it clear We will try our best to assign candidates their first preferred city. In case it is not possible, they will be assigned a city following their given order of preference

Non-MCQs without negative marking
Apart from Multiple Choice Questions (MCQs), a few Non-MCQs in each section will be asked for the first time in CAT 2015. These questions will not be followed by answer options and the candidates will be required to solve and write answer in the given space on the computer screen. Unlike MCQs there will not be any negative marking penalty for the wrong answers to Non-MCQs. What credit has been earned by the candidates will not be affected adversely due to writing incorrect answers to Non-MCQs. It could improve further your percentile and you may answer these questions without any fear of any loss of score.

10 minutes more to same number of questions
Instead of 170 minutes for 100 questions in CAT 2014, there will be 180 minutes (full 3 hours) to take CAT 2015 consisting of same number of 100 questions. 3-4 more questions can be attempted in 10 more minutes; candidates can review their last section they are attempting whether there is any question left unanswered or wrongly answered or left for review.

Please remember you can avail this opportunity only for VRC section as this will be the 3rd section and since sectional time constraint of 60 minutes for each section exists in CAT 2015, the additional time can be utilized for the last section only.

No need to schedule the Test date & session
CAT 2015 test takers have to appear in the exam on a single day on Nov 29, 2015 either in morning or afternoon session. IIM Ahmedabad has taken due care to schedule the test on Sunday. CAT 2015 takers do not have to weigh the pros & cons when and where to schedule their test. CAT Centre 2015 will make all out efforts to allot the first preferred test centre to the candidates.
You are free from long nightmares when to schedule the test and get the best and convenient date as used to happen during the 15-20 days testing window. Aspirants will get the information about their test site and session with the issuance of CAT 2015 Admit Card on October 15.

The only job of aspirants is to prepare well for CAT 2015 and score high sectional as well as overall percentile.

Score Normalization; easier with same difficulty level
1 day, 2 sessions same type of questions, same pattern and same exam composition are what CAT 2015 has in store for the aspirants. No more calculation is required to assess what appeared and when during the many separate sessions, what is the difficulty level through each session and how the score for each session could and each day would be normalized by CAT 2015 testing agency and IIM Ahmedabad. CAT 2015 scoring and normalization is proposed to be thoroughly transparent. The difficulty level through the 2 sessions is expected to remain the same and the scoring and normalization of scores will not make an issue in CAT 2015 as happened in CAT 2013 which attracted court cases on score normalization issue.

No gap; no technical issue
CAT 2015 has also taken due caution not to linger on the test dates providing even a single day gap and give a chance for technical glitches to happen. All the preventive measures have been taken to ensure a transparent and aspirant friendly test. IIM Ahmedabad has plugged all the shortcomings that could happen in the conduct of single day test. It is expected that CAT 2015 will be a smooth exam without any technical problems.

No leave from office needed
CAT has been a preferred test for working people as more and more working executives appear in CAT every year. No leave request to office will be needed by the working professionals who plan to appear in CAT 2015 as the date falls on a Sunday. If you are preparing for CAT 2015 and wish to get into IIM in 2016, its a good opportunity as the difficulty level in CAT 2015 is also expected to be moderate.

Common Admission Test (CAT) 2015 gateway to IIMs and other top B schools will be held on November 29, 2015 in 2 sessions. The format of exam will comprise 3 sections beginning with Quant (34 questions), DILR(32 questions) and VRC(34 questions). The candidates will have to observe sectional time constraint of 60 minutes for each section and cannot move from one section to other until the 60 minutes for the existing section are over. Each correct answer will carry a credit of 3 marks and each wrong answer will attract penalty of 1 mark from the awarded credit. For the first time in CAT 2015 there will be a few Non-MCQ type of questions where no answer options will be given and the candidates will be required to type the answers on computer screen.