BITSAT Review
By Vernon Fernandez ('04 EEE) and Sandip Gangakhedkar ('05 EEE)
BITSAT ’05 was announced through a press conference on 15th December, 2004. The last date for the receipt of applications was announced as 31st January ’05.
Approximately 57,000 applications were received. 48,435 candidates appeared for the exam at centres all over the country. 11,611 of these were female. 1400 candidates were successful, 800 in Pilani and 600 in Goa.
Each candidate was given a choice of centre and of date and time. This gave the students a lot of flexibility as they had to appear for other competitive exams as well. Faculty in charge of PS and professors on campus also took on the responsibility of overseeing the procedure in the respective centers.
Demographics
The post BITSAT demographics gives a rosy picture of regional parity etc which was quite amiss in the normalized percentage procedure followed by BITS Pilani. This new cosmopolitan crowd is strongly in tandem with what BITS Pilani has always envisaged as a university. One odd fact however, is the surprisingly low percentage of  girls, 14% in Pilani, admitted this year. The factors that contributed to this drastic skewing are varied and subject to much debate, prominent among them being the existing educational system which promotes the ‘coaching class” culture where guys get more preference and flexibility for going to the “renowned” coaching classes. This coupled with a patriarchal societal system which tends to favour boys and thereby put girls at a disadvantage in competitive exams like IIT JEE, AIEEE etc. Another factor could be the lack of awareness about the various educational avenues in BITS, like MMS and B. Pharm. However the institute plans to take affirmative action to remedy this problem. Where the authorities feel that initiative
send more girls should
come from their parents, our VC Prof. S Venkateswaran says that the institute is, looking to increase the number of girl participation in the test by introducing certain incentives like reservation quota for girls etc. Much of it is still in the process of discussion.
Problems
One might wonder how ride through the first ever online test was- a bumpy and rutted one or was it a smooth sailing experience? Prof. Raghurama, Dean Admissions and Placement believes it was the latter….where problems faced, in terms of software, security, management were close to none or nothing that hadn’t been envisioned. He however believes that the mammoth task of pulling off an online entrance of this stature has its own challenges. Meeting these challenges and bettering the given norms comes as part of the responsibility of organizing a completely new entrance test, and improvements are in the offing. Nothing tangible, so far, has been decided but we can look forward
to a possible increase in the no. of centers, increasing software efficiency etc.
BITS – The Role Model?
One avenue which BITS still holds its mark is its acknowledgement of 12th standard result which had been relegated to the background with increasing emphasis on entrances. Admission to the toppers from every board was granted this year too in spite of an entrance and 17 board toppers from the 2005 batch now inhabit the campus. The required cut-off in the 12th exam was 80% apart from BITSAT score which reiterates BITS stance on this issue. Recently the IIT’s have introduced a 60% cut off for entrances…emulating BITS should we say? Prof Raghurama smiles and says “We can’t be sure but if they are, then the institute is happy that others are also waking up to the importance of school results”.
With the BITS administration being highly satisfied with the whole process, BITSAT will most certainly be conducted next year with necessary improvements and new features.
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