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CAT 2014 Experience

I wasn’t actually planning to put a “CAT Experience” post, but since many people have requested one, here goes. As many people have said, the CAT was not that tough this year, a sight for sore eyes…

Soft kitty

I’ll divide this into two posts, this one detailing the overall test-taking experience and another one with my take on the test level and what it might entail for future slots. This will also give me an opportunity to address many rumours and fears which seem to be proliferating in the aftermath of Sunday’s slots.

Some of you might directly wish to jump to the other one 🙂

Pre-test procedure:

I wrote CAT ’14 in the morning slot on Sunday. My friend and I arrived at 7:15. We were let in at around 7:45 or a little after, with a first round of basic checks i.e. admit card + id proof. (I believe people were allowed in till a little past 8:15 at my centre. However, don’t take risks on this – there were reports from some centres of latecomers being summarily ousted. That extra twenty minutes of sleep could cost you a year. Unlike in previous years, there was a board outside with a list of names and the allotted labs/computers. There were two labs at my centre, with nearly a hundred students.

Things were pretty well organised at the centre (Aruna Manharlal Shah institute, Ghatkopar, in case you’re wondering) – they had even opened the cafeteria so that once we got in, we could refresh ourselves with some basic breakfast (dosa and chai, in my case). After a jolly half an hour there laughing at the people doing frantic last-minute mugging, we went up to the second floor where the labs were. There was a registration room for the final formalities, and waiting rooms to await our turn (these rooms were where we were required to deposit our worldly goods, such as they were; no tokens were provided but as far as I know everyone got their stuff back without incident)

When leaving the waiting room, you were allowed to carry only the admit card (on the topic of admit cards, please make sure the print is decent; black and white is fine, but the photo should resemble you and the signature should be reasonably clear, and you need to stick one recent colour photo on the card) and an ID proof. A quick webcam mugshot and Left Thumb Impression later, we were directed to our hot seats.

The system provided was unexceptionable with a large and clear screen and a responsive mouse. The space between rows was cramped, though, and the icing on that cake was that the on/off switches for the computer were located on the floor directly beneath the monitor. Right where I would normally put my feet. Which means I spent the entire test with my legs carefully cramped as far back as they would go. Non-ergonomic, to say the least!

Having got in, another short wait ensued – during which we were handed a single sheet of A4 paper (don’t worry, you can ask for more if you like, they keep count and you have to submit them all at the end) and a single ballpen. We were asked to enter our passwords and then wait till the server reckoned it was 9:30 and told us to start. (The keyboard, although present, is not meant to be touched – one enters one’s password via the mouse using an onscreen keyboard. We were assured that touching the keyboard would stop your test and put your session in jeopardy; not surprisingly, none of us tried the experiment)

During the Test:

The interface was smooth, no significant glitches. A few points worth noting:

  1. Scoring: the test clearly and unambiguously stated: +3 for a correct, -1 for a wrong and no penalty for unattempted questions.
  2. When a question was answered and marked for review, it was not listed in the “answered” count obtained by hovering over the section name. However, we are assured that those questions (indicated on the right by a violet dot with green tick) will also be evaluated.
  3. Highlighting feature was absent in the RCs (I don’t use it myself, but those who rely overmuch on it should probably beware)
  4. In some RCs, a curious thing happened – three questions were asked, then an LR set came up, and then the same RC popped up again with a 4th We don’t know yet whether this was intentional or fortuitous, whether it was a feature or a bug.
  5. There were colourful graphs in the DI section. I don’t know about other folks, but I was quite cheered by them!
  6. There were frequent interruptions – a couple of attendance sheets were passed around, the invigilators came to collect the admit cards mid-test (you have to sign in their presence and hand over the card), and a few times the invigilators’ phones made weird noises. So be prepared to keep a firm grasp on your concentration.
  7. When the 170 minutes were up, the test automatically stopped (making the submit button possibly the most redundant piece of coding I have seen in years) and the screen showed a summary of attempts in each section and overall. Then we all trooped down to hand in our rough paper and pens, and walked free into the wide open spaces. (Note: please don’t forget to take along your id proof while leaving – as you would probably have pushed it into some corner of the desk, out of your way, it is surprisingly easy to forget

regards

J

 

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D-day

All the best for CAT, everybody! Today, we finally come face to face with the incubus that’s been hovering over our minds for months.  A day for dedication, a day for dreams, a day for destiny…

…a good day to meet arguably the most famous mystery cat in literature! 🙂

Macavity, the Mystery Cat – T. S. Eliot

Macavity’s a Mystery Cat: he’s called the Hidden Paw –
For he’s the master criminal who can defy the Law.
He’s the bafflement of Scotland Yard, the Flying Squad’s despair:
For when they reach the scene of crime – Macavity’s not there!

Macavity, Macavity, there’s no one like Macavity,
He’s broken every human law, he breaks the law of gravity.
His powers of levitation would make a fakir stare,
And when you reach the scene of crime – Macavity’s not there!
You may seek him in the basement, you may look up in the air –
But I tell you once and once again, Macavity’s not there!

Macavity’s a ginger cat, he’s very tall and thin;
You would know him if you saw him, for his eyes are sunken in.
His brow is deeply lined with thought, his head is highly domed;
His coat is dusty from neglect, his whiskers are uncombed.
He sways his head from side to side, with movements like a snake;
And when you think he’s half asleep, he’s always wide awake.

Macavity, Macavity, there’s no one like Macavity,
For he’s a fiend in feline shape, a monster of depravity.
You may meet him in a by-street, you may see him in the square –
But when a crime’s discovered, then Macavity’s not there!

He’s outwardly respectable. (They say he cheats at cards.)
And his footprints are not found in any file of Scotland Yard’s.
And when the larder’s looted, or the jewel-case is rifled,
Or when the milk is missing, or another Peke’s been stifled,
Or the greenhouse glass is broken, and the trellis past repair –
Ay, there’s the wonder of the thing! Macavity’s not there!

And when the Foreign Office find a Treaty’s gone astray,
Or the Admiralty lose some plans and drawings by the way,
There may be a scrap of paper in the hall or on the stair –
But it’s useless to investigate – Macavity’s not there!
And when the loss has been disclosed, the Secret Service say:
‘It must have been Macavity!’ – but he’s a mile away.
You’ll be sure to find him resting, or a-licking of his thumbs,
Or engaged in doing complicated long division sums.

Macavity, Macavity, there’s no one like Macavity,
There never was a Cat of such deceitfulness and suavity.
He always has an alibi, and one or two to spare:
At whatever time the deed took place – MACAVITY WASN’T THERE!
And they say that all the Cats whose wicked deeds are widely known,
(I might mention Mungojerrie, I might mention Griddlebone)
Are nothing more than agents for the Cat who all the time
Just controls their operations: the Napoleon of Crime.

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Data Interpretation – Strategy

When attempting a test like the CAT, a fair number of people follow the (mindless) strategy of “attempt question 1, move to question 2 only after that is done, then question 3…” and so on, often failing thereby to see all the questions. One should remember that one need not win every single battle to win the war. Given that most people (even most people who will eventually make it!) will not attempt all the 100 questions, your “shot selection” becomes very crucial. You need to recognise – as Rahul Dravid used to so elegantly – which balls to hit and which ones are best left alone, and the faster you can judge this the better.

This becomes all the more crucial in the “set-based” questions (DI, LR and RC) as it generally takes significantly longer to judge these. A typical singleton question (such as a parajumble or remainder or PnC or vocab-based one) can be weighed in 20-30 seconds, and judiciously left without feeling too bad about it. But a set can take up to 3-4 minutes just to understand in detail; and if after spending so much time you realise that you have not been able to decipher it, it can induce a panic.

In the past 5 years, there were 30 questions in each section and there would be around 9-10 questions each (or 3 sets each) of DI or LR. This year, it is likely that there would be 4-5 sets, and as many as 15-18 questions, of each. This means that, as in days of yore, your choice of which sets to attempt first could become crucial. In this post, then, I will try to look at possible mechanisms and criteria to help in the decision-making process (as always, this is indicative and you will have to adapt it to your own areas of strength and weakness) so that you can pick and choose which sets to attack first without actually getting into the nitty-gritty details.

Here are some questions you could ask yourself:

1) Is the given data in a familiar form or in an unfamiliar or haphazard state? And is it precise or ambiguous?

If the data provided is in a standard table / line graph / pie chart and is complete and precise, then even if there is quite a lot of data it should still be very manageable. However, if

  • the data is provided in an unfamiliar form – a histogram, a scatter-chart, a cumulative table, or some even more esoteric format (which means you would require an inordinate amount of time just to understand how to interpret it properly)
  • there is some data missing (which means solving the question might entail a lot of pre-work)
  • the data is not precisely readable, such as a bar- or line-graph where the values can only be approximately estimated to around 5-10% accuracy (which means that even with your best efforts accuracy cannot be guaranteed)
  • the data is presented as a caselet (which means you might have to spend precious time at the start to bring it into a manageable form)

then it might be worth leaving the set for later.

2) Is there additional data provided in the questions?

I’ve observed that a lot of people base their judgement of the difficulty level of a set solely on the pre-information before the questions. In my opinion, though, the questions are almost always worth a dekko; if they are straightforward queries like “Who is sitting next to Mr Sivaramasubramanian?” or “In which year is the profit of Megahard Corporation the maximum?” or “How many people failed in maths?” and the options are not of the “Cannot be determined” flavour then it is a pretty fair indicator that the set is going to give you definite answers in one go.

But if you see questions such as “If Germany defeats Brazil 7 – 0 in the final round*, then who will end up in 3rd place overall?” or “if in 2014, Froogle reports a 10% growth in sales and an 8% growth in costs over 2013, then what will be their percentage profit in 2014?” or even more flagrantly evil question-types like “Which of the following cannot be true” giving three statements and options like “I and II only”, “All of I, II and II” and so on (which effectively means you have to solve 3-4 questions for the price of one), then I would recommend you skip lightly on to the next set and return later.

* This example is a work of fiction and any resemblance to any real-life match is purely coincidental. 

3) Does the set lean more towards the calculative or the reasoning based?

This can be a powerful decision point, depending on your skill-sets. A set which involves intensive calculation is unlikely to go out of its way to confound you with traps, while one which involves simple numbers will often require careful reading and weighing of alternatives. (Personally, calculation is something of a strength for me and hence I choose to do the calculative sets relatively early on, but as I said earlier, this decision has to be based upon your knowledge of your own strengths and weaknesses.)

4) How far apart are the answer choices?

This is a useful question to ask yourself when deciding between two calculative sets. If the answers are far apart – on a percentage rather than absolute basis, mind you! – then you can approximately fairly wildly and still arrive at a correct answer confidently. (For example (3, 7, 12, 18) or (35.7%, 52.8%, 88%, 122%)) However if the answers are close together, then you calculations must needs be carried out with nit-picking accuracy and this will affect your speed as well. (For example (62375, 62525, 62845, 63635) or (35.7%, 36.8%, 38.7%, 39.9%))

5) How many questions are there in each set?

If the sets are similar on the above parameters, then this could be a tie-breaker – a set with 4 questions will give you more value for money (i.e. more marks as a result of the time spent on it) than a similar set with 3 questions.

Try and apply the above criteria to a set in real-time, under test conditions. An excellent case-study would be the DI-LR section from CAT 2008, which had 7 sets covering a wide range of types and difficulty levels. If possible, in a future post I shall try to do a video analysis of the same and roughly demonstrate how one could have approached the section during the test.

regards

J