Saturday 21 September 2013

Preparation for other exams

There are a variety of competitive exams besides JEE advanced. Some common ones being KVPY, JEE main, national standard examination in physics (NSEP),  national standard examination in chemistry(NSEC) , Indian national physics olympiad(INPhO) , Indian national chemistry olympiad(INChO) , BITsat, and state entrance exams.
Except olympiads, the other exams can be easily cracked if you have prepared well for Jee advanced.
Jee main syllabus contains a few topics that are not covered in jee advanced syllabus. But covering them is no big deal. Just study ncert books for these topics and you are done. Same goes for KVPY and state entrance exams.
The problem comes with olympiads. You qualify to appear for INPhO and INChO. These exams require indepth knowledge of the topics. These are subjective exams and are much above the traditional jee level. These exams test your knowledge and not your speed(compare it with jee which focuses mainly on speed).
You need to have a firm grip on concepts and an idea of how to "write" rather than "tick".
Around 40 students are declared as "pass" in INPhO and INChO each. If you clear these, then you are eligible to appear for olympiad camps held in Mumbai. Clearing the camps let's you participate in international olympiads!!
Here are some books that are useful.
Physics olympiad: IE irodov, past year papers.
Chemistry olympiad: past year papers.
This year(2013) because the INPhO paper was extremely tough, the cutoff was very low(31/60). The details can be found at www.olympiads.hbcse.tifr
Do appear for NSEP and NSEC.
Cracking the above competitive exams boosts your confidence.

Saturday 7 September 2013

Life @ IIT-B...

Friends, parties, gossiping, hostels, assignments, fun, competitions, orientations, sports, rains, seniors, lingo, mentors, sleeping during lecture, food stealing, sleeping late night, ... this is all I can say about IIT-Bombay...
Being at a place which is a "Dream place" for innumerable students has a different experience. Life @ IIT-B is simply awesome.
Its been some one and a half months here and life is amazing. Think of any random activity, and you will find a dedicated club for it here.
You get to know the brilliant minds of the country. People here are simply D-Best. They are good at everything - from academics to sports - All rounders.
There is a hill (Sameer Hill) and a beautiful lake (lake Powai) inside the campus. The campus is literally what you can call as - Green Campus.
The freshies have been allotted Hostel 15-B (I stay at the tenth floor :) ), and the view from my room is beautiful. Sky touching buildings of Hiranandani can be seen...
Here you are made familiar with a bunch of activities - RC plane designing, RC car designing, dance, music, sports, treasure hunts, techfest, mood indigo, Freshiezza, salsa, and many more.
A striking feature of IITB is "Tum Tum", the buses that ply inside the campus, and connect the hostels to the academic area. You can find IITians hanging at the door of buses, Strange isn't it ?? Yeah... you get all sorts of experiences here.

You get to enjoy sleeping during lectures, pain of engineering drawing (Tip: never talk to an IITian about his engineering drawing assignment... he will simply murder you), Computer lab assignments, difficult physics lab experiments, poor examination scores, night outs, etc etc.

Let's talk something different..
What do you call a girl at IITB ?? think??
Answer: visitor :P ... poor joke indeed but it's true.
Here in IITB there is a shortage of girls. People are mad about "Bandis", or rather "despo" about bandis, as you say that in IITB lingo
Here in IITB, I got an opportunity to try many different things - Table tennis, Drama, RC plane, Video making, Photography, Rubik's Cube, Skating and many more.
Coming to sports, there is a swimming pool, volleyball court, Kho-Kho, football field, athletics track, cricket field, hockey field, basketball courts, lawn tennis courts, weightlifting room, table tennis room, squash court etc etc and the best part is - you can try em all !!!
IIT bombay has it's own lingo, it's own dictionary - bandi, DAC, daya, matka, despo, ditch, DoSA, enthu, fart, farra, freshie, machau, give-up, infi, insti, junta, lukkha, mug, pain, poltu, SAC, sophie, tumtum etc are a few commonly used words.
Ragging: IITB has strict anti ragging policy. The seniors are more of friends and are too helpful. Seniors are ready to help you in all possible way. There is a mentor for this who basically is a kind of local guardian. Mentors help us in our problems and ofcourse, if there is a senior with you - then "treat to banti hai!!".
To end, campus life at IITB is an amazing experience. Prepare well for JEE and reach this place - Your life will change. Sacrifice everything to get to this place and you will get back more than what you sacrificed.