Our estimated minimum targets for overall CAT score for general category students from different disciplines
who have a consistently good academic record
Arts/Humanities - 95%ile
Commerce/Management/Business - 98.6%ile
Engineers - 99.75%ile
Bachelors in Sciences/Dentists/B.Pharms etc - 99%ile
(Please note that the above are estimates based on our experience and data. No one can guarantee a call. You are responsible for any decision you make based on this analysis)
The detailed shortlisting and selection criteria for IIM Ahmedabad for the Class of 2018 is available
here.
The first instinct after seeing the criteria is that most aspirants are going to be left scratching their heads. It is the most complicated criteria that we have seen from IIM A (since the time criteria became public).
While the ingredients of the criteria remain similar to last year, the AR normalization and differences in weights attached make the criteria complex.
Some salient features
1) The changes seem to hint that IIM Ahmedabad is trying hard to increase diversity of background of candidates. The attempt seems to be get more non-engineering background students to get admission - a process which had started 2 years back. We expect that among the 180 odd general category admits next year, the diversity will be very high.
Only 50% of general category admits for the Class of 2018 will be from engineering background as per our estimates.
In the process there is also hope that there will be more female students. IIM Ahmedabad has avoided relaxing norms for female candidates like the other old IIMs - IIMs CLIK.
2) Do note that IIM Ahmedabad is not doing any board/university wise normalization at all. The adjustments are based only on the academic disciplines you are from.
3) The other thing that clearly stands out is the high amount of importance given to past academics by IIM Ahmedabad. If you are not a consistent performer you will not stand a chance at IIM Ahmedabad. Most general category students with 10th and 12th scores less than 80% will find it almost impossible to get in.
4) Work experience has no weight at all in the shortlisting of candidates. The number of freshers is going to be very high in the Class of 2018.
There are 2 main routes to get an interview call from IIM Ahmedabad
1st Route to get a call
There are 7 Academic Disciplines that IIM Ahmedabad has identified and categorized. If you are among the top 1% in that discipline based on a Composite score formula that is calculated by IIM A, you will automatically get a call. This process does not look at which category you belong to (General, OBC, SC/ST etc)
So how does this work?
You need to first satisfy a 3 point criteria
1st - Meet the minimum percentile cutoff criteria - Overall 90+, Sectionals - QA 90+, DI/LR 80+, VA/RC 80+
2nd - If you meet this criteria you need to meet the next based on your 12th Disciplines,
P ≥ 80 (Science), 77 (Commerce), 75 (Arts/Humanities)
Where P is the average of the percentages of marks scored in 10th and 12th std. exams.
3rd - (Percentage of marks in the bachelor’s examination) ≥ Minimum cut-off percentage (discipline-wise as shown in the Table 5).
Let's assume Shyam a Commerce graduate scored 98.5%ile in CAT 2015 with a 92%+ in all 3 sections!
- His scores in 10th and 12th are above 85% and his graduation score is 75%. Being a commerce graduate puts him under AC-3.
Super! He satisfies all the three criteria above.
Hold on,
Meeting the 3 criteria above won't give you a call yet! (And this is just the first route for shortlisting that we are still talking about. Talk about making things complicated!)
Now, an Application Rating Score will be calculated based on the tables below
At different stages of the selection process ‘Application Rating’ (AR) score of an applicant will be used. An applicant’s AR score is the sum of the rating scores ‘A’, ‘B’ and ‘C’ (Tables 2-4) based on her/his percentage of marks obtained in 10th standard, 12th standard (depending upon the stream, viz., ‘Science’, ‘Commerce’ ‘Arts & Humanities’) and bachelor’s degree examinations (depending upon the discipline) respectively
So, how do we calculate Shyam's Application Rating score based on the above data?
8 points for 10th Std + 8 points for 12th Std + 7 points for Graduation (under AC-3) =23
But, this needs to be normalized!
So, IIM A has a formula for that too. Normalized AR score of an applicant is equal to his/her AR scores divided by average of the top 50 AR scores from the applicants’ pool.
So if the average of top 50 AR scores is 28, then Shyam's AR score is 23/28 =
0.82
We are not there yet! Now we go the final step,
CS (Composite Score) = 0.3 (Normalized AR score) + 0.7 (Normalized overall score in CAT-2015)
Now, there will be a normalized CAT Score based on the equivalent CAT score. So if Shyam has scored 98.5%ile it will have an equivalent absolute score in his marksheet which will be normalized with the CAT 2015 topper's score (our guess). Let's assume that comes to a figure like 0.78
So Shyam's CS = 0.3 (0.82) + 0.7 (0.78) = 0.792
Now, if 0.792 is among the top 100 people or top 1% of all Commerce category (AC-3) aspirants whichever is lower Shyam will be shortlisted for the Written Test and the Personal Interview
Imagine this for all the 7 disciplines now. Phew!
Our Analysis - We expect roughly 400 general category candidates to get a call through this route. For an engineer getting a call through this route means scoring in excess of 99.85%ile at the minimum (this is our estimate based on last year's data)
2nd Route to get a call
(Updated - IIM A removed the grad criteria through this route which caused much fury. However for general category candidates it will make hardly any difference according to us)
This route will only be used for
remaining candidates. What this means is that there is certain amount of candidates that IIM A will interview in each category (General, SC/ST, OBC, PWD). If after the first route that number has not been reached, the remaining candidates will be picked up from this pool.
We believe there will be very few general category candidates who will get calls from this route. This route is more relevant for candidates under the quotas - OBC, SC/ST. PWD.
We have a 3 point criteria again.
1st Criteria - Preliminary screening - 1st thing is you need to satisfy minimum criteria based on your category and the cutoffs given below to be considered. The process remains the same as in route 1 mostly except that cutoffs are relaxed based on which category you belong to :
2nd Criteria - P ≥ Minimum cut-offs (specific to the category and the stream as shown in Table 6)
Where P is the average of the percentages of marks scored in 10th and 12th std. exams.
Once this has been met, repeat the AR calculation and the CS calculation as explained in the 1st Route above. The top candidates with a CS score in the respective category will be called for the written test and personal interview.
Our Analysis - We don't see more than 200-250 general category candidates being called for the process based on this route as we expect around 400 candidates to get called from the Route 1 itself. For all other categories, this is the only route to get a call.
Final selection
Selection at this stage will strictly be based on the ranks of the candidates computed separately for each category (General/SC/ST/NC-OBC/DA) on the basis of their ‘Final Composite Scores’ (FCS).
The numbers selected in different categories will be in proportions mandated by law. The FCS of a candidate who appears in AWT & PI will be computed as follows:
FCS = 0.40 (Normalized PI Score) + 0.10 (Normalized AWT Score) + 0.5 (CS).
The normalized PI and AWT scores of a candidate are equal to his/her PI and AWT scores divided by the average of the top 1% scores in PI and AWT respectively.
The above is a fairly standard formula for final selection under each quota. Note the virtual irrelevance of the work experience factor. It may have an impact in the interview but that's about it. No marks for having worked.
Do ask us, our experts and partner schools for a 360 Degree evaluation of your profile
here
For last year’s selection criteria at IIM A,
read here
Read everything about IIM A
here
For selection criteria of various old IIMs last year,
click here
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