There has been enough written and said about CAT and how to prepare, write, tackle etc. There are however a few issues which are worth revisiting especially when you come closer to the day. We have a little less than two weeks to go for the exam and it is imperative that these tips (if you want to call it that) become a habit and come to you naturally when you sit down to write the CAT exam.
If we look at the changes in CAT, you notice two patterns, either that there are too many changes or that there have been no changes.
Too many changes
From a high of around 190 questions in four sections to be done in two hrs (in the 1990s) to 75 questions in three sections to be done in 2 1/2 hrs can be seen as a drastic change. Barring a couple of years, there has been no CAT which had the same structure as its previous year.
There was a time not too far back (2004), when there was differential marking. Traditionally, CAT had equal marks for every question regardless of the difficulty level; however, in CAT 2004 and CAT 2005, there was differential marking. There were questions that carried 1 mark, 2 marks and even half a mark.
The paper was for 2 hrs (120 min) almost all through its history except in CAT 2006 where there were 2 ½ hrs (150 min) to tackle the same.
From a predominantly Vocab and Grammar based questions, it is now more of a verbal reasoning paper in the Verbal/RC section.
From a high amount of traditional DI with calculations, the paper has become more of a Logical Reasoning paper with logical puzzles and games.
It changed from being an arithmetic-based paper to a part-reasoning part-algebra (with a lot of geometry and numbers thrown in) paper.
Too few changes
There has been no change in the areas that have come in CAT.
When there were 90 questions in CAT 2005 there were four choices per questions. In CAT 2006, there were 75 questions but with five choices per question. Effectively, you are doing the same amount of elimination and solving. Also, the probability of getting a question right does not change if you guess the answer.
The paper is once again becoming more arithmetic heavy as was seen in CAT 2006. Therefore, the changes are probably being undone.
In CAT 2003, there were 150 questions and the cut-off for that paper was around 55 net marks. About 40 per cent marks were required to get a call from the IIMs. In CAT 2006, out of 300 marks, you were expected to get around 120 marks, again just 40 per cent of the marks in the paper. There is literally no change in the way the paper was and the paper is except that the number of questions or the choices or the marking is changing. But then, that is the least that is expected from CAT every year. If there were no changes, that by itself would be a big change!
How to tackle the changes
First, you don't have to tackle any changes. Just do the right moves. Whatever the paper, there are going to be three sections.
Give yourself only about 135 minutes to do these three sections. The last 15 minutes should be used as buffer to spruce up the scores or salvage a section which might not have gone your way.
Timing and sticking to the time limits is critical in CAT. Many a time, there is the temptation to continue doing a problem/set when one should leave it. A golden rule should be followed. If you are not getting a question/problem in the first one min or a minute and a half, then skip that question. In a DI question, if after the first three minutes you are not clear what the next steps should be SKIP IT. There is no other way.
Keep your cool however difficult the paper is. First, we don't expect the paper to be easy. Therefore, if the paper is difficult, it would obviously be according to your expectations. Welcome that. And make sure that you don't unnecessarily start thinking of the cutoffs and marks and percentiles. It is futile. You still have to do as well as you can. Why bother what the cutoffs are. As the understanding goes, you wouldn't be able to do any better or worse just by knowing the cutoffs. You would still do what you know.
If there is one strategy that you have to adopt, it should be with the clear objective of doing every question that you know. It means that you give sufficient time to each of the sections to ensure that you flush out every easy question (specific to your abilities) and solve and mark the same.
For each section, we have approximately 50 minutes. However, depending on the strengths and weaknesses you have to give around 50 +/- 10 minutes for each section to maximise your score. The minimum that you have to give a section is around 40 minutes.
In the next two weeks take about two to four mock tests, try these basic strategies and thoroughly analyse the pros and cons of the strategy so that you have a strategy ready for the actual CAT.
We will revisit the strategy for tackling the individual sections over the following days.
All the best!
ARKS Srinivas is an alumnus of IIM Calcutta and is the Director of T.I.M.E. Mumbai.