BHUBANESWAR: With medical and engineering entrance examinations round the corner, coaching centres in the city are luring students with several new schemes.
With course studies for the exams over, most coaching centres are now offering practice test series (PTS), both online and offline. While the PTS in two prominent coaching centres in Satyanagar began earlier this week, it is set to begin next week for most others. Besides offering the mock tests to their enrolled students who received coaching round the year, the tutorials are also offering the test to other students.
"The test is open for all. We are charging a nominal fee of Rs 8,000 for 15 tests," said coordinator of a coaching centre.
A new company in Bhubaneswar on Sunday announced the launch of an online test series for All India Engineering Entrance Examination (AIEEE) and IIT Joint Entrance Examination (IIT-JEE) for a cost of Rs 15,000 to Rs 20,000.
"Since the real time tests have become online, the online mock tests will help acclimatize the aspirants for the big day," a representative of the company said. AIEEE is compulsorily online for 22 cities, including Bhubaneswar. Students who have never appeared for any online test and do not have any exposure of working on a web-based platform face considerable challenges while taking a time-bound test.
"Our tests will be of great help to such students," he said.
The centres claim their test series mimic the real one. "Till the preliminary All India Pre-Medical Entrance Test (AIPMT) on April 1, our tests will be on the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) pattern. After April 1, we will start an exclusive series for Odisha Joint Entrance Examination," said a chemistry teacher at a coaching centre.
An estimated 80,000 students have been receiving coaching from three prominent centres in Satynagar area of the city. It is estimated another 30,000 students would join the test series at the centres.
Educationists, however, cautioned students not to fall in the trap of alluring advertising by these centres. "Deviation from fundamental study to question and answer based approach is not going to help students much," said S N Mohanty, principal of BJB Junior College.
Mohanty said the most important aspect of study should be fundamental understanding of the subjects. Other efforts at best could be complimentary, he said.
Dr R N Panda, principal of Institute of Higher Secondary Education, a Plus II college in the city, also expressed similar views. Though taking frequent tests can help students learn better time management, it is clarity about the fundamentals of the courses that is of paramount importance, he said.
"Without fundamental study, students won't be able to answer if the question is tweaked a little and would not help them crack highly competitive entrance tests such as those of IIT JEE and AIEEE," he said.
Panda said students who are to appear for Plus II examination this year should not fall prey to taking the test series by coaching centres. Instead they should concentrate on the Plus II examination, which they need to qualify with good scores to be eligible for various entrance examinations.
