CAT or Common Admission Test is the national level entrance examination for management aspirants that is carried out on a rotational basis by the Indian Institute of Management. This year’s CAT 2020 examination will be tentatively conducted in the month of November 2020 in various cities across India.
The exam is regarded as one of the most crucial examinations for every management aspirant. This is because, CAT examination opens the doors for candidates not only for admission to 20 IIMs but also to more than 1000 B-Schools across India.
Being one of the most important exams, the preparation for CAT cannot be taken lightly. Here, one of the primary questions that strike the mind of a candidate sitting for this examination is whether to prepare independently or take the help of a coaching centre.
The aim of this article is to address this dilemma by asking certain questions to the candidates about themselves and thereby help them introspect and make an informed choice.
What is your level of efficiency?
Ahead of taking any important decisions regarding your preparation, you must reflect on your behavior in previous situations. In particular, you must evaluate yourself and think of whether you are disciplined and can stick to a plan or are more prone to procrastination and over-thinking. Depending upon your calibre, you may clear CAT in a short duration, or it might take two to three attempts to crack it.
Subject to your tendencies, you must make the appropriate choice for yourself. Normally, the flexibility of self-learning is best suited for those candidates who are well-aware of their learning and can set goals for themselves and achieve them, while also improving upon their performance.
Less disciplined candidates, on the other hand, would do well with the structure offered by coaching classes. In a way, test series can offer the best of both worlds for aspiring candidates.
How many hours per day can you devote for preparation?
CAT, in many ways, is a difficult and challenging test. So, if you are an aspirant of CAT 2020, you have got just about six months for preparation. It is best that you should realize how much time you can devote to CAT preparation per day. Moreover, you must consider how much time you can study in a day without losing concentration.
Here, you should ensure that these study-hours also consider your learning efficiency and usual productivity. The number of hours you thus decide must be a commitment, regardless of whether you take self-study or a coaching class.
For sure, self-study is better suited to those with uncertain and unpredictable schedules. On the other hand, the planned schedule of a coaching class will ensure you cover everything in a short time and is perfect for people with set schedules. Evaluating your dedication to this examination and keeping your schedule realistic can certainly help you make a more rational choice.
What are your strengths & weaknesses?
Identifying the level of understanding of the CAT syllabus is critical for an aspiring candidate. And in case you want to go to a coaching centre, it is extremely important to consider your good and bad concepts before moving ahead.
This exercise does not involve contrasting yourself with your classmates or other applicants but instead evaluating your own performance and classifying topics as strong or weak area. You can always make use of a mock test or a test series to get an objective analysis of the same.
Choosing to join a coaching class might help you to gain a better understanding of some concepts. But, if you feel comfortable with most of the concepts, you can consider revising on your own or making use of test series, instead of a coaching class.
What is your level of motivation?
The entire journey of CAT preparation demands that you ensure your mind is stable, and you can cope with the entire ordeal of studying long hours and putting in your all for an examination.
There will be several occasions in your journey where you will not wish to continue, but you must focus on the big picture at such times. Enrolling in a coaching class might just help you to cope with this by showing you that everyone goes through the same struggle. Nevertheless, practice, patience, and perseverance are essential qualities for every student hoping to crack the CAT.
Here you must remember that if you are determined nothing can stop you, but if your confidence wavers, nothing can help you!
What is your arrangement of preparation resources?
Know that, in case you choose to go for the option of self-study, you must be able to arrange the study material for yourself. There are a lot of great resources for CAT preparation on the internet and on YouTube. You can also always use platforms like Brainly, and other question-answer platforms to clarify your doubts on your own.
It is required that you must be willing to put into finding the best study material from all the sources you have available. Opting for a coaching class, on the other hand, will give you access to comprehensive study material at one place. In addition, you can also get individual attention from certified instructors, depending on the coaching class you choose.
What is your take on introspection & evaluation?
Strategy for evaluating yourself at timely intervals has to be an integral part of every study plan. This will ensure that you are, in fact, progressing and getting closer to mastering all the concepts required for the CAT. Timely checks on your own progress and restructuring your plans accordingly for future study sessions should become an imperative part of your CAT journey.
This is not an issue at coaching centres as they provide regular mock tests and topic-wise quizzes, as well as other assessments. For the self-studiers, however, it is strongly recommended to attempt all the past papers and sample papers they can access. You should also consider investing in a test series for this very reason.
In reality, there is no proven methodology in CAT for scoring a good percentile. There are a large number of students who worked alone and cleared the CAT in their first attempt. Therefore, before investing any amount of time or money in coaching, assess yourself by going through the parameters mentioned above.
All said, you must remember that at the end of the day, it is ultimately you who has to put in the efforts, regardless of the coaching classes or self-study pattern.
