CAT 2014: First Day Analysis & Cut-Offs

The CAT exam began today all over the country and after five years of the 60 question format, this was the first time the IIMs had put out a two section, 100 question format.

While difficulty level is subjective, most students will find this paper much easier than any of the recent CAT exams.
Quant was Easy. Most students will find this one of the easiest Quant papers in the last 15 years.
DI was time consuming but definitely not difficult.
The only section that could be classified as difficult was the LR one which had 2 out of 4 sets which were difficult.
Expect cut-offs to be quite high, especially in Sec 1.

Outside of the difficulty level, there were no surprises as such but widely expected topics such as Data Sufficiency, Phrasal Verbs, Fill in the Blanks & FIJ were all missing. Please note that this is only sharing one of the first slot experience and is possibly not representative of students' within the in different slots. All students within the same slot got the same set of questions.

A detailed analysis of the exam is provided below followed by the experience a student will go through before & during the exam. To practice for other MBA exams, click here for XAT | NMAT | SNAP | CMAT | MHCET | CAT 

Expected Cut-Offs:- 

Cut-off Score	Percentile
215+	99.9
176+	99
139+	95
121+	90
96+	80

Note; These are estimates only and it is recommended that you do not use it as targets. 

Section 1 Analysis:  Out of 50 questions, there were 34 questions on Quantitative ability and 16 on DI. Very similar to what was anticipated and given on the mock test of the IIM CAT. There were several sitters in the paper especially in Arithmetic and Numbers. DI had four sets with one on Tournaments. A serious candidate who spends 90 minutes here could have attempted 35+. 

Section 2 Analysis:  Out of 50 questions, there were 16 questions on RC across four passages with the passages of 450-550 words. And there is no highlighting feature. It is mentioned in the beginning of the exam itself that you will have RCs in four question blocks. Two of the RCs had only three questions together and the final question of each passage was isolated somewhere else in the paper. So do check for this before you believe you have completed your RC passage. There were very few specific detail questions and while many of them required a good understanding of the passages, they were easily doable. Logical Reasoning  had 16 questions across four sets. Surprising aspects was the low weight for pure Verbal ability topics such as Grammar, Fill in the Blanks and Vocab. CR had GMAT style questions on inferences and few on essence of short passages. There were 8 Parajumble questions with half of them being on sentence exclusion. 

NMAT Scheduling FAQs | Results

The results for the first window (tests taken up to October 22nd) were out this Sunday. The final shortlisting of candidates for Case discussion & Interview will only be done when the final results are announced on January 22nd 2015. The cut-offs will be around the 95%ile levels like in recent years and hence the cut-off score could vary depending on the distribution of scores at the end of the exam cycle on Dec 20th.
Click here to sign up for 10 NMAT Mock Tests.

NMAT FAQs- Find answers to a few commonly asked questions below.

CMAT Sep 2014 Result Analysis & College Cut-Offs

The CMAT results were published today and the top score was 323 while the lowest score was -40. 43,212 students wrote the test which is a significant drop from the 60,000+ who registered in September last year. The result summary is shared below.
The disappointing news for CMAT test takers that came in last week was that JBIMS has decided not to use CMAT scores for admission this time around. Admission into JBIMS will use scores of only CAT & MH-CET. Click here to prepare for CMAT Feb 2015 | MHCET 2015

*The approximate cut-offs for a few colleges under CMAT is shared below. Please note that there are only rough guidelines and the actual cut-offs may vary and parameters for selection depend on various other factors as well. 

Click here to prepare for CMAT Feb 2015 | MHCET 2015 

College Name	~Percentile Cut-Off*
SIMSREE,  Mumbai	96
Goa Institute of Management,  Goa	94
Great lakes Institute of Management,  Chennai	94
K. J. SOMAIYA IMS&R,  Mumbai	94
Prin. L. N. Welingkar IMD&R,  Mumbai	94
XIME,  Bangalore	92
XISS,  Ranchi	92
IMT,  Nagpur	92
SIES College of Management Studies,  Navi Mumbai	92
IILM-GSM,  Greater Noida	92
N. L. Dalmia IMS&R,  Mumbai	90
PUMBA Department Of Management Sciences,  Pune	90
Prestige Institute of Management,  Indore	90
ITM,  Mumbai	90
Accurate Institute of Management & Technology , Greater Noida	90
MIT School of Business,  Pune	90
St. Xaviers College ,	88
IFIM Business School,  Bangalore	88
IFMR,  Chennai	88
Amrita School of Business,  Coimbatore	86
Gaur Hari Singhania Institute of Management & Research,  Kanpur	86
Alliance School of Business, Bangalore	86
Indus Business Academy, Bangalore	86
Institute of Health Management Research, Bangalore	86
Jaipuria Institute of Management,  Lucknow	86
MIT School of Business,  Pune	86
Sinhgad Institute,  Pune	86
MET Institute of Management,  Mumbai	86
IES Academy,  Mumbai	86
Kirloskar Institute of Advanced Management Studies ,  Harihar & Pune	86
PSG Institute of Management,  Coimbatore	86
ISB&M,  Pune	86
Indus Business Academy,  Bangalore	86
Vivekanand Education Society's Institute of Management Studies and Research ,	86
JRE Group of Institutions,  Greater Noida	86
Acharya Institute of management & Sciences,  Bangalore	86
Jaipuria Institute of Management Studies,  Lucknow	86
Jaipuria Institute of Management Studies,  Noida	86
DoMS,  Durgapur	86
Chetna,  Mumbai	86
Jaipuria Institute of Management,  Ghaziabad	86
Balaji Institute of Management,  Pune	84
LLIM,  Mumbai	84
Acharya Business School,  Bangalore	84
ASM's Institute of International Business & Research,  Pune	84
Indira Global Business School ,  Pune	84
Jaipuria Institute of Management Studies,  Jaipur	84
IIF,  Noida	84
IMT,  Hyderabad	84
Asia Pacific Institute of Management,  New Delhi	84
Medi-Caps Institute of Techno-Management , Indore	82
Indira Institute of Management,  Pune	82
Christ College,  Bangalore	82
Amity University,  Noida	82
MET,  Mumbai	82
ISB&M,  Kolkata	82
BIMTECH,  Greater Noida	80
Nirma Institute of Management,	80
Acropolis Faculty of Management & Research,  Indore	80
Dr. D. Y. Patil Institute of Management ,  Pune	80
Indira School Of Business Studies ,  Pune	80
Jaipuria Insitute of Management,  Indore	80
NIILM,  Greater Noida	80
New Delhi Institute of Management,	80
Birla Institute of Technology,  Mesra	80
Doon Business School,  Dehradun	80
LBSIM,  Bareilly	80
Apeejay School of Management,  Delhi	78
Jaypee Business School,  Noida	76
AICAR Business School,  Karjat	76
Amrut Mody School of Business,  Ahmedabad	76
MITSOB,  Pune	76
Delhi School of Business,  New Delhi	76
ISBR,  Bangalore	76
Sharda University,  Greater Noida	74
Institute Of Management Studies,  Ghaziabad	72
Prin. L. N. Welingkar IMD&R,  Bangalore	72
ITM University ,	70
IMI,  Bhubaneswar	68
Ramaiah Institute of Management Studies,  Bangalore	68
SDMIMD,  Mysore	68
Vignana Jyothi Institute of Management,  Hyderabad	64
JIMS,  Delhi	62
SCMS,  Cochin	60
Thiagarajar School of Management,  Madurai	58
Regional College of Management,  Bhubaneshwar	56
VJIM,  Hyderabad	56
BULMIM,  New Delhi	54
Hyderabad Business School,  Hyderabad	54
KIAMS,   Harihar	52

How to Improve Mock Test Scores?

 

The answer is simple but rarely followed - Analysis. Remember, it is what you do between mock tests that will define your improvement.

Yet, what most of students do is take a mock test, view score & percentile, and move onto the next.  All this approach helps in, if at all anything, is to help you get used to the time & pressure. 

 

A few students asked us how to analyze, and here's how you can do so. While it may take you 3 minutes to read through this, it may save you several hours while analyzing.

Once you complete a mock test, click on the  button next to the corresponding mock test

1) View the questions you got Wrong: These are questions on which you spent a lot of time, yet got it wrong. Find where your concept or approach went wrong. Click on "Review Wrong" and this takes you through solutions of only the wrong attempts. You will not be shown any of the other questions (Correct or Un-attempted ones).

2) Attempt the Un-attempted ones: You can take an un-timed test of only the Un-attempted questions in the mock test. Click on "Review Unattempted" and this allows you to attempt all the ones left unanswered. Again, you will not be shown the other questions (Wrong and Correct ones) and can focus only on the un-attempted ones.

3) Review the Correct Attempts: Without spending too much time, quickly review the ones you got correct as well and check if there were better solutions or approaches to the one you adopted.

4) Take tests on your Weak Areas: Oliveboard's Adaptive Engine figures the top three areas that you need to work on the most based on your performance data and gives you lessons (to brush up concepts) and tests on those topics. After each mock test, find new lessons + tests on your weak areas by visiting the "Improve" section.

For analyzing your your exam taking strategies, click on  button next to the corresponding Mock Test.

5) Analyze Graphs: These are detailed reports on your time spent & accuracy section-wise, along with benchmarking reports on your score and percentile. Use these to better improve your time management and question selection within sections.

There maybe more than one can do and analyze it in different ways that suits one's preparation. But whatever logical option you choose as an analysis method, do not forget to spend time on analysis before your next mock test. Click here to login and start analyzing. 

NMAT 2014-15 | Last Minute Tips Before Exam

Many of these tips may appear basic but are vital as the NMAT is a speed based exam and small optimizations at your end can help you score 10-12 extra marks. 

CMAT 2013 Exam Pattern

With just over a couple of weeks remaining for the CMAT 2014, let us revisit the most recent pattern of CMAT. (The following is a reproduction of the article we posted last year after the CMAT exam.)

Pattern & Question Types:

No major surprises. There were minor changes compared to last year(2012) but nothing alarming. The paper’s level should ensure no easy 350s this time round. A word of caution, like always, that reading this will not give you any significant advantage. If at all anything, you might just avoid any surprises.We will not get into difficulty level analysis as that is subjective but overall the level was a notch above Feb 2013.

MBA Exam Dates, Test Pattern & Registration Deadlines

With the MBA exam season about to begin this month, there a number of dates to remember. Right from application deadlines to exam dates. And each exam has its pattern. To help you keep track of all the important dates and deadlines of every MBA exam along with their respective test patterns, we have created the table below. If you want a downloadable copy, please click here.