Comments on: Indian Graduate Admission based on GRE?

By: GATE or GRE? « Unruled Notebook

GATE or GRE? « Unruled Notebook — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 11:17:29 +0000

[...] Tags: gate exam, gre exam, indain academics, indian phd admission Almost an year after, my note on GRE instead of GATE for graduate admissions is getting a re-look in the wake of IISc considering applications from [...]

By: I am not interested in you « Unruled Notebook

I am not interested in you « Unruled Notebook — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 16:25:33 +0000

[...] ARE WELCOME. Finish your undergrad successfully and apply for an MS in research to our department – with or without a GATE [...]

By: Arunn

Arunn — Wed, 25 Jun 2008 05:48:55 +0000

Kaushik

Thanks for sharing your views.

I personally believe that a lot of good students end up in not so good US universities, because IIT has not positioned and sold its Masters and Doctoral Program as well as it has done its Undergrad program.

I concur.

Cheers,
Arunn

By: kaushik

kaushik — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 00:32:12 +0000

Dr Arunn,
Like some of the others in the replies, I cleared both GATE and GRE. I did a Masters at IIT and am now in a PhD program in the US. I think, what accompanies GRE is also the detailed applications and the essays and recommendations. The US system, in a way, checks for the motivation of the student to pursue a masters. In India, (from what I found), many of the students coming through GATE are not that interested in the degree or research, but for the employment opportunities (in Govt sector or Software). That the intake through GATE is more of the un-interested student than a student with genuine interest, is the bigger problem.

In my opinion, IITs should continue with GATE, but should think up of better policies (vis-a-vis recruiting by good research companies and a good pay, or even a passport to top 10-20 schools in the US for a PhD) to retain the good non-IIT BTech students, who are keen on a Masters. Right now, I personally believe that a lot of good students end up in not so good US universities, because IIT has not positioned and sold its Masters and Doctoral Program as well as it has done its Undergrad program.

By: Arunn

Arunn — Mon, 12 May 2008 19:24:49 +0000

Dear guys who have commented until now: Thanks for your thoughts. Shall respond soon in a separate post.

Cheers,
Arunn

By: Anand Kumar

Anand Kumar — Mon, 12 May 2008 07:40:14 +0000

Dr. Arunn,

This issue needed thought and it is really nice of you to have raised it on a public platform (if I could dare to call this so).
1. GATE was a good exam before its questions were accompanied with multiple choices. I don’t see any harm in removing this current trend and reverting to the original.

2. GRE is an examination, in my opinion, that demands the use of a language that cannot be spoken. More seriously, TOEFL could be a better option if one wanted communication skills to go hand in hand with technical capacity.

3. In my opinion, the higher one studies, the more of mathematics he faces. But the mathematics section of any GATE paper is generally too simple and this is where one could actually question if GATE is still credible enough as an entrance examination.

4. I do have a solution in hand. If equal weightage could be given for both – GATE and the interview that follows, it should do a lot of good. IITM mechanical engineering branch does not have any interviews before admission while all other IITs do. But those interviews again end up filtering students with lower scores and admitting the top rankers.

5. The admission process is another joke. A top ranker gets a seat in every IIT and blocks the seat till the end of the admission process. People with slightly lower ranks don’t get a seat anywhere, though they are qualified enough to do so. My AIR was 324 and I got a call for interview from all IITs except IITM. And the interview dates clashed and I could attend only one out of four interviews, where more than 500 students were being interviewed in a single day for a little more than ten seats. I was about to take admission at PSG tech, when fortunately, the spot admission process came up and I was given a seat. Now, does this mean that IISc and all the IITs put together cannot offer 324 seats in the general category for an M.Tech in Mechanical Engineering with all specializations put together?

These are some major issues I found with GATE and I have added my thoughts on the admission process that follows. Again, this is just my opinion and I shall stay updated on this through your wonderful site.

By: Ankit Gaur

Ankit Gaur — Mon, 12 May 2008 06:25:41 +0000

The point made for the GATE to be subject exam and thus ” potential students who have finished their UG degree some years back (and working somewhere) and want to take the examination are so apprehensive of what they need to study that they don’t even give it a try. ” is completely valid. I for one agree that GATE does identifies those fellows who have done undergrads well but it also leaves out the fellows who have potential for Grad studies but not slogging for GATE .So there should be some seats for such candidates also.

By: arnab

arnab — Mon, 12 May 2008 02:13:15 +0000

I had cleared both GATE (for my Masters at IISc) and GRE (for my PhD at US) and so I guess I am more qualified than many to comment on these exams. Please note that GRE is nothing but a joke (!) and it in no way tests anyones analytical skills; at least not anymore since they have removed the analytical part some years back. Don’t tell me that the Quanti and the Verbal parts test anything about a prospective graduate student. The reason GRE exists (at least one of them) is that the US education system needed one standard exam to judge students across all spectrum for admission to grad college (engg, science, liberal arts, et al) and GRE kind of serves that purpose. Most top ranked schools here in US use the GRE score as a tie-breaker, and that is never ever considered as a primary requirement. This is particularly true if someone has a Masters and applying for a PhD through GRE.

As someone has pointed out GATE is necessary to standardize the undergraduate engineering education, which varies widely across the country. A mere 3 months of slog can get one a good GRE score, but to get a good GATE score one needs to know the fundamentals — whatever coaching one takes for it — if he/she has learned nothing during the 4 years of undergrad the path to GATE won’t be particularly rosy! And regarding specialization stuff, that doesn’t happen right away. After one enters the Master’s program various new ideas/avenues normally emerges in front of a student and based on that he/she might completely choose a new stream to specialize than intended while entering. It is in that respect a thorough fundamental understanding of the whole stream becomes important and GATE tests that too.

Besides GATE does not ask lengthy questions anymore. The whole exam is now multiple choice based — which in my opinion is the right direction.

By: gigi

gigi — Sat, 10 May 2008 13:57:52 +0000

GATE seems to be similar to AGRE (which dramatically increases chances of assistantship in fields like CS in the US)
I agree – maybe a quota stream for students interested in continuing education (their companies can pay) is an idea worth exploring.

By: carpediem

carpediem — Sat, 10 May 2008 10:10:53 +0000

parseval has rightly pointed out the problems with GRE in the Indian context . (Add to that the fact that a large fraction of people hardly learn any ‘engineering’ during undergrads, and maybe at least some people do put an effort to get the basics right for the sake of GATE only). So it seems replacing GATE with GRE is not going to help much in selecting the ‘right’ candidates for those few M Tech seats in those few instis.

But even GATE is plagued by many problems. Like JEE it’s also ‘highly coachable’. Currently I am doing M.Tech at an IIT, and I was amazed to find that more than half of of the students in my branch had undergone ‘coaching’ for a yr after finishing BTech (at Hyderabad/ Delhi ) !!!!

And now with all those reservation policies and proposed new institutes etc, the issue is getting only trickier .