MY JEE JOURNEY: PART TWO

 MY JEE JOURNEY: PART TWO

Welcome back dear Reader. I apologize for the long wait. By now, I am pretty sure you got a basic idea of my situation at the end of 11^th standard. I had switched to online classes and was trying to balance it with my regular physical lectures. I gathered a much better understanding of the concepts, yet I could not score marks in the tests that were held in my coaching class. That was the dilemma for me.

Then, when 12^th standard began, something happened in my life that changed my point of view and set my course straight.

I remember the evening quite clearly. It was sometime during the month of April. My dad had been wanting to talk to me for quite a long time. So one particular day he took me out for a pep talk and we went to a small garden in the interiors of Bandra. We sat down on a bench, I, waiting anxiously for him to talk, and him, calculating and contemplating how he would start the conversation.

Let me give the reader a little context. If you are an aspiring engineer in 12^th grade, your life revolves around one major competitive exam known as JEE. Every aspirants’ path interlaps at JEE. JEE is like the ‘flashpoint’ for every student. You cannot avoid it. At some point or the other you have to face it. Now the thing about JEE is that it is broken into two exams. One is JEE Mains, which is a relatively tougher exam as compared to any other engineering competitive exam. But if you are preparing for JEE Mains then you are ready for pretty much any other examination because it covers every topic under the sun. Now, if you can score a good percentile in JEE Mains, you are allowed to qualify for a higher level examination known as JEE Advanced. JEE Advanced is considered as one of the world’s toughest exams. To crack that exam is not everyone’s cup of tea. It requires critical analysis and out-of-the-box thinking attitude.

And my problem was that in my class tests I could barely score enough marks to clear JEE Mains much less even qualify for JEE Advanced. Yet, I kept studying for both the exams because I did not want to ‘give up’. And THAT was the attitude that was killing me.

That was the exact same thing that my father explained to me. He showed me the mirror and made me understand that whether or not I could clear JEE Advanced was a secondary issue. My main issue was first qualifying for it. If I cannot even qualify for a particular exam, then why should I prepare for it? Why should I waste my time over it?

Hence, from that day onward, I stopped focusing on JEE Advanced. I killed my dream of going to IIT and snapped back to reality. I was hurting myself and my progress because of this unethical wishful thinking that I could achieve victory in Advanced. Whereas the reality was that I could not even manage JEE Mains.

Slowly and steadily, my pressure reduced. I got more time to study for Mains. That must mean that I also scored better marks in my class tests right? Nope. Unfortunately, that was not the case. Even now, after cutting back on many hours’ worth of work, giving more time to Mains, I still could not score marks on my class tests. Does the reader understand the vicious cycle now? No matter what I did, no matter how I acted, no matter who I took advice from, my marks never improved. And at this point of time, I was tired. I was worn out. I had lost hope.

Around October 2023, me and my parents had completely given up on my physical coaching classes and were searching for online tutors. And that is the time when one of my close friends swooped in to help me. He had smartly quit the coaching class at the beginning of 12^th grade itself and had found separate online tutors for math, physics and chemistry. He saw me struggling and decided to help me by sharing the contact of his teachers. That is when things started to improve a little. I hired my friend’s chemistry tutor who was really impressive. My chemistry improved a lot and I was beginning to gain hope. I had stopped giving the class tests as it was of no use anymore. I only focused on finishing off the portion. I hired another math tutor from somewhere else who was equally capable and thus, my skills in math improved too. While physics was relatively fine, my progress in chemistry and math tweaked. The two tutors and my friend were the ones who really helped me.   

By then, I had started researching on ‘Competitive exams apart from JEE’ or ‘Competitive exams easier than JEE’. I found out that not every engineering college requires you to clear JEE. There are quite a few examinations that are conducted solely for one particular college or one particular state.

In fact, almost every state held their own exam which the student could use to take admission in any government-affiliated engineering college. One such exam was Maharashtra State Common Entrance Test or MHT-CET. Through MHT-CET I could take admission in any college of my choice all over Maharashtra (except private universities and IITs/NITs).

But the reader must understand one thing here. The easier the exam, the worse the college. It is just simple logic. If you aim for the best college, you have to give the hardest exam. If you wish to give an easy exam, lower your aim to an inferior college. But at that point of time I had already sacrificed IITs. So I was ready to stoop even lower even if it meant that the college I am going to would give me a low ROI.

So up until December 2023, I had completely given up on JEE altogether. My only aim was MHT-CET and other private university examinations such as BITSAT, MET, COMEDK, VITEEE, etc.

And I haven’t even addressed the elephant in the room yet. Board exams. How could one forget that. In the vast dullness and dismay over competitive exams, there was only one such exam which gave a student comfort. And that was the board exam. Every student’s ace in the hole. We have a love-hate relationship with board exams. In the entire course of the 2 year journey, we do not focus on boards as the reigning idea that roams over our head is that ‘board exams are easy. Even if I open the book a day before the exam, I can clear it off’. Some people go as far as to not even purchase the textbook until the last moment. And that is when the ‘hate’ part of the relationship takes over. You start to realise that you heavily underestimated board exams. They seem to appear as a wolf in a sheep’s clothing. And you haven’t even thought about the journals and practical exams. Now you begin to regret missing out on all the board lectures.  

But somehow, you manage it. The practical exams are anyways rigged (the only plus point of an integrated course). And every friend group has that one person who always seemed to have resources and knowledge about the board exams. In my friend group, that person was me. I made a smart move during the beginning of 12^th grade. When I realized that I had to stop focusing on JEE, I began preparing for my board exams. Everyday, little by little, I completed the portion. And by the end, I was confident enough that I would score at least minimum 75%. Of course (SPOILER ALERT!) at the end I managed to score 92%.

Another tip that I would like to give to my juniors who are in integrated is that – beware of the college during practical exams. They will trouble you, bother you, exert you, make you frustrated and what not. But no matter what, you must always keep your head down and talk to the teachers with respect. They are just trying to take out their frustration on you that has been pent up in the entirety of 11^th grade. Especially during journal checkings. I have heard stories of people who were sent back from college just because a small part of their journal was incomplete. I have seen people erasing their graphs and calculations 10 times before getting it right. I have had to clear the 8085 processor innumerable times and manipulate it just to get the desired output. And that is the reason why you should always focus in the practical lectures that take place. But eventually you do manage it. You have friends around you who are going through the same thing. One of you will eventually figure it out and then help you manage the same. It is all about memory power and presentation.  

Anyway, let me take you back to January 2024. The new year. So far all you have been hearing from me was failure, frustration, screw-ups and let-downs. The only good news so far were the two tutors that I had hired for chemistry and math. But 2024 is when the good tidings finally came. I knew that I had to prepare for my board exams in February. But before that I had my JEE Mains exam in January. Even though by then I had given up on JEE, for old times’ sake I decided to give one last try. But this time, I did something completely different.

I started solving questions that had already been asked previously in the Mains exam in the preceding shifts. They were what we call as PYQs or (Previous Year Questions). And that, is when my eyes were opened. I had been doing it all wrong so far. I never referred to any recent PYQs of the year 2023, 2022, 2021, etc. And even if I did, I found them difficult. But when I actually got the paper in my hands I found out that not every question is of the same difficulty level. Any PYQ that I had ever solved before seemed tough because I stumbled upon them in my coaching class module. And the coaching class module does not contain easy questions. Every question included in the module was handpicked by professionals to be the most difficult question in the shift. And that is why I thought that every question asked in the exam is difficult. But no one ever told me that the majority of questions are actually very basic and conceptual. Only a few percentage of the questions require you to scratch your brain.

But by then it was too late. I had my exam in the next few weeks and no matter how much I practiced those PYQs, it would never be enough. But my score improved greatly. As compared to my class tests, in which I never even scored above 60 or 70, I used to get above 100 in the PYQs. And that improved my confidence greatly. Never had I expected myself to perform so well. In fact, no one had either told me that you don’t actually have to score a perfect 300/300 to get a good percentile. Just scoring 160 to 170 marks out of 300 was more than enough. And finally when I actually gave the exam I got around 89 percentile in the first attempt. Which was of course, nothing great. But it was an indication that I was on the right path. That I had finally found my holy grail. PYQs. And I stuck to it for the rest of my journey. That was my motto. That was the ultimate formula.

PYQs are also what finally helped me in board exams too. They are also what helped in other qualifying exams. Now I may boast a little in the next paragraph but bear with me. I have been bashing myself since the last two articles, I am sure the reader wouldn’t mind if I stopped being modest for a few lines.

I got 98.23 percentile in MHT-CET examination. And that is actually a very good achievement. The reason was – as you might have guessed it – PYQs. I bought a big and expensive book which contained 4500 questions. And I kid you not when I say, I solved 4500 questions in a matter of 3 months. Those 2 years of JEE preparation were finally paying off. And similarly, I prepared for other such exams and got a decent score/percentile. By the end of my journey, it was not a matter of ‘which college would give me admission’ but rather ‘which college should I take admission in?’

So to sum up my 2 year journey, I had a rocky start. Fresh off the boat of 10^th standard board exams, thinking I could conquer the world. By the end of 11^th standard, I no longer had hopes that I could even become an engineer. And by the end of 12^th standard, I had a hard time trying to choose which college should I take admission in.   

In the end, dear reader, it worked out for me. This journey taught me many things.

1)   Friendship – The friends you make along the way may not stick around for life, but appreciate them while you can. They went through the same storm as you did. They needed you as much as you needed them. Even if you may lose touch with them, the memories will last forever. Cherish them.

2)   Self-reliance – I depended too much on my teachers and on my classes. At the end, my self study and online videos are what helped me. When I stopped attending classes and started solving questions on my own, that is when my progress stopped getting hindered.

3)   Guilt – Burnouts were caused by guilts. I took my career way too seriously and that affected my mental health and of those around me. It does not mean that you regard your preparation and commitment as inconsequential. It just means that know when to stop. There is a limit. Sometimes you need to break it, but at other times you need to respect it.

And finally, Hope. As Andy Dufresne famously said in The Shawshank Redemption – “Remember Red, hope is a good thing; maybe the best of things. And no good thing ever dies.”

Trust yourself. Have faith and have hope. Eventually it all works out if you want it to.

Thank you.