Fewer engineers may walk in to the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad (IIM-A) after CAT 2013. With a significant change in its admissions policy, the premier management institute has decided to welcome students from diverse backgrounds. According to the institute, over 96 per cent of students in the 2012-14 and 2013-15 batches come from an engineering background.
As per the new criteria of selection effective for the 2014-16 academic session, work-experience of prospective candidates will assume lesser weightage and preference will be given to the most recent academic score which means marks obtained in the class 10 and 12 examination will be given less importance.
From each of five academic disciplines covering the arts, commerce, medicine, science and engineering defined by IIM-A , the top 50 or 1 per cent (whichever is lower) of the applicants with the highest Common Admission Test (CAT) scores within each category, will get a direct pass to the written ability and interview rounds. For the rest, the school will use 'composite scores' (combining their CAT scores and 'Applicant Rating (AR)', a combined score of past academic grades) to shortlist candidates for personal interview (PI).
The new system of selection, however, eliminates work experience and the master's degree grades from the AR. This change will bring freshers on a level-playing field with candidates armed with work experience.
.png){kind=logo}