(II) How did the ICAD team deal with recent changes by National Testing Agency (NTA) in JEE Question and Exam Formats ???

A Slight change in examination format leads to tremendous changes in the strategy, contents, and delivery of institutions. For example, in 2020, there are two major changes in examination format after JEE is taken over by National Testing Agency (NTA). First, the inclusion of Numerical Questions wherein students are supposed to calculate and put numerical values in the answer instead of clicking usual right options. Second, the marking system of examination changes from 360 to 300, while total time remains the same, i.e. 3 hours.

Now majority of institutions respond to these changes with indifference. So what, students have to put numerical value instead of clicking options. Students will do it in examination. Or we will give some examples to practice numerical questions, and students will practice them. That's enough. ICAD's response here is somewhat comprehensive. When numerical questions are part of the examination, then it should be integral part of institution content, and students practice. ICAD changed its 87 Lecture Plans, rearranged and modified 34716 Questions in 2019-20 to make students' jobs easier. Now students practice numerical questions on every chapter daily.

Also, there is separate research conducted on Numerical Questions as there are many unclear issues, whether NTA wants exact match, for example 4.25, or range will do. Complete academic team decoded the same in the first JEE (January) attempt. They will further clear this issue in May attempt (JEE second attempt postponed due to corona lockdown). Students will only develop confidence of scoring once they get clarity of these issues.

Since the last 7 years of JEE test format of 360 marks, ICAD team developed every question paper of their biweekly testing, revision testing, part revision testing, and full length testing. Such a huge repository of tests was outdated as soon as the marking system changed to 300 marks from 360. When the timing is the same and marks reduced, it is no rocket science to tell that the difficulty of question paper increased a bit and previous tests required overhauling. ICAD team of 45 competent faculty members is on task and they prepared 30000 questions each subject with a level of difficulty and solutions, so that they can easily cope up with current changes and changes expected in future.

All in all, ICAD incorporated all these changes of numerical questions and new test format right from the very second week of announcement of changes, and kept the momentum going.

Team ICAD