AU Counselling
A counselling session in progress at Anna University, Chennai. With counselling for engineering students in the general category round the corner, students and parents are confused regarding the choice of course and college. Nearly 1.23 lakh candidates will attend counselling to fill 69,731 seats in Government colleges and the Government quota seats in self-financing colleges.Further increase in number of colleges and courses only adds to their concern. The reservation sub-heads have also increased to seven from the original five - (OC – 31, BC – 23, BCC (BC Christian) – 3.5, BCM (BC Muslim) – 3.5, MBC – 20, SC – 18 and ST – 1).Though experts say there is no reason to panic if one goes well prepared, attending counselling remains a formidable task. Only when the candidate reaches the counselling centre – Anna University, Chennai – does he/she get an idea of the vacancy position college-wise and course-wise in OC / BC / BCM / BCC / MBC / SC / ST categories.
Would their choice become easier, if they get to know the colleges where they can get admissions, based on the previous year’s results? For those who find themselves in a similar dilemma, there seems to be a plausible solution in sight. The website, http://www.collegesintamilnadu.com/ has found favour for providing not only one’s aggregate marks for medicine and engineering, but also the number of students who have the same aggregate and those who have higher.
This time it has loaded a programme based on the 2007 Tamil Nadu Engineering Admission (TNEA) cut-off mark and rank of each college in the State, affiliated to the Anna University. According to R.V. Srivatsan, Director of Adroit Techno Solutions, Chennai, who has hosted the site, the candidate should key in his aggregate mark, course interest and reservation category. The site comes up with colleges he has a chance to get admission.
“Though this is not the present position, it will definitely give a fairly good idea as to where the candidate stands,” he says. The result is expected to vary slightly because of the increase in number of colleges (roughly 25 – 30), number of colleges that have got converted into universities, increase in number of courses, and also the sub-classification of BC into BCC and BCM. Besides these, the aggregate marks that the students have obtained in 2008 are slightly on the higher side, what with nine candidates tied at 200.
“It can still prove to be very useful by taking into account plus or minus five to the candidate’s aggregate. This will save time and narrow down the options the candidate will have to give at the time of counselling,” adds Mr. Srivatsan. Since every choice is computer generated at the counselling, the aggregate mark analysis based on the 2007 TNEA list would be a fool-proof pointer for engineering aspirants. Looking up the website can surely be part of the preparation process for students to reduce their anxiety on the D-day.
