My experience with IIT Coaching

No story of any successful IITian is complete without a description of the coaching centre they went to. So, here is a summary of my experience with my coaching centre and how it was helpful in my journey to IIT.

Joining the coaching centre

Among all the coaching centres for JEE, me and my parents had chosen one particular centre. I had earlier joined it in 7th and 8th, and I enjoyed their teaching (although, I must say, the “JEE coaching” that is provided at such a young age does not help much for JEE itself!)

I wrote the admission test for the same institute in 10th grade again. The test consisted of multiple choice questions in IQ, physics, chemistry and math, with negative marking. Based on our performance, we were given a scholarship on the joining fee. I got a pretty good score, so I joined the next year.

Batch Reshuffling

Hardly a few months into the program, there was a “reshuffling test” (based on the syllabus covered so far by the coaching centre). In this test, the top performing students (from all batches) were promoted to a different batch. The format of this test resembled the JEE Advanced format. As it turned out, I joined this more “advanced” batch. The impact of this was that I joined a classroom with some of the sharpest minds of Bangalore, and some of our teachers were better as well. Hence, the reshuffling went a long way in my JEE preparation.

Major Challenges

During my two years at my coaching centre, arguably my biggest challenge was managing both my school classes and my coaching classes. While the syllabi of JEE and CBSE are similar, JEE is more than a few levels ahead of CBSE. Also, the topics covered in school are (usually) not the same as the ones taught in the coaching centre at the same time. So while all the fundamentals were done in school, we were dealing with more advanced things at the coaching centre. While my focus may have been more towards schoolwork for the most part, it was only in the last few months before the JEE that I could consolidate all my JEE coaching (when my fundamentals were the strongest)

Another challenge was that the coaching centre was quite far from my house. I would often need to ride in public transport through “Bangalore traffic” to reach my destination! This had the tendency to make my daily routine quite hectic, especially since I had classes on weekdays as well. Occasionally, I was forced to miss classes as well (due to various factors), and it became difficult to catch up when that happened. In the middle, we even considered shifting to a different coaching centre. But we eventually decided against it because of the peer pressure in the “advanced” batch (that was not present in other coaching centres).

Tests, tests and tests…

If I could describe the tests of my coaching centre in one word, it would be “challenging”! The various practice tests set by my coaching centre were much tougher than the ones set by its competitors.

In reality, the JEE consists of 2 papers – Main and Advanced. JEE-Main is conceptually easier (and more of a test of speed) than JEE-Advanced. But the difficulty level of the practice tests I wrote meant that the focus appeared to be more on JEE-Advanced (rather than JEE-Main). However, one must clear JEE-Main to qualify for JEE-Advanced, and I made sure I practiced JEE-Main level tests in addition to the tests of my coaching centre.

The tests were of various kinds. They were in both JEE-Main and JEE-Advanced formats. Some of them were attempted by candidates only within my coaching centre; others were attempted by candidates all over India. The all-India tests intended to give an idea of your performance/rank relative to all other candidates in India. This is important when preparing for an exam like JEE. Since the JEE was going to be conducted in a computer-based mode, some of the tests we had were computer-based as well. We had some test or the other at least once every month. In addition, teachers encouraged us to do a “test analysis” after every test to ensure we do not make the same mistakes again. Clearly, practice was the key in JEE preparation!

Study materials and teaching

The study material that I was provided, in my opinion, was not the best at explaining concepts and topics. However, the questions were good (though they were mostly suited to JEE-Advanced rather than JEE-Main). It was therefore necessary to buy some standard textbooks for grasping the concepts in all the subjects. Taking notes in class was also helpful to get around this problem.

As I was part of an “advanced” batch, the teaching was very good. It was aimed at solving the toughest problems that could appear in JEE-Advanced. This also meant it was costly to miss classes, which was sometimes inevitable. I made sure I took notes as much as possible, and this proved to be helpful in the end. The teachers completed the JEE syllabus well in advance, and I could study what we had covered in class easily.

The final lap…

With my board exams, JEE-Main and JEE-Advanced round the corner, and coaching classes done, the time had come to lay out a strategy. The first exam was JEE-Main (attempt 1 – Jan, 2019) My 11th and 12th grade concepts were quite strong already, so I built my JEE-Main fundamentals on top of them. Soon after JEE-Main came my board exams, giving me a chance to further strengthen my basics. After this, I attempted the JEE-Main again (this was attempt 2 – April 2019) in the hope of improving my score.

Soon, I had cleared JEE-Main and qualified for JEE-Advanced. Preparation for this was undoubtedly the toughest and the most crucial. With the strong fundamentals I built, I practiced previous JEE questions and full-length papers in real time. This helped familiarize me with the various types of questions. At last, I wrote the JEE-Advanced, and to my delight, I was able to clear it with a pretty good rank. After counselling, I managed to get B.Tech (Engineering Physics) in IIT Roorkee.

Conclusion

My journey with my coaching centre has had its share of ups and downs, and despite the challenges I faced, my efforts paid off in the end. Joining an IIT is definitely worth it, because of the competitive peer group that is not seen in other colleges. In conclusion, if you want to achieve something, it is necessary to put in hard work, effort and determination to reach your goal.