Increase in percentage of female aspirants for JEE Main 2019 (January); Know More

JEE Mains is one of the important examinations conducted for seeking admission to engineering and architectural courses in eminent colleges including the Indian Institute of Technology IIT. This year the examination will be conducted by the National Testing Agency or NTA. JEE Main 2019 exam is all set to be conducted in January and April in the year 2019.

However, though the number of candidates appearing for the examination has decreased, there is a relevant increase in the percentage of female aspirants who have enrolled for the exam. As per reports, the percentage of enrolment by female candidates has increased by 29% with a total number of 9.65 lakh students registered for the exam.

JEE Main 2019 registration

A significant increase is seen in the number of female candidates who have applied for the examination compared to the previous year. The total percentage has increased to 29% in comparison to 24% in the previous year. As per the report released by NTA, a total number of 11.5 lakh candidates enrolled for the JEE Main examination conducted on April 2018. In which the total number of female candidates was merely 10.4 lakhs.

From this year, the examination will be conducted by the NTA, twice a year in multiple sessions. The examination was previously conducted by the CBSE board.

Gender diversity in engineering colleges

Early in the year, the government issued a directive so as to increase the gender diversity among the engineering colleges across the country, which was highly dominated by more male candidates. On the same lines, the NITs have also passed directive so as to increase female enrolment in BTech courses in tandem to the levels prescribed by the IITs.

As per the directive, each of these institutes such as NITs, IITs, etc. must admit a minimum of 14% female candidates through the mode of creating supplementary seats. Based on this plan, the government deems to achieve a 14% increase in 2018-2019, 17% increase 2019-2020 and 20% in the year 2020-2021.

With these initiatives, the government is deeming to pave roots for the enrolment of female candidates in BTech programmes, states the academic head and Vice President of Gradeup, Navin C Joshi.

How will the directive help students?

The directive has led to the creation of additional 1,000 seats across the various technical institutions.

States Navin C Joshi furthers that the educational preference has gone through a transition with more students opting for medicine to engineering in last years. High incubation rates in MBBS has been noted as one of the reasons for this transition along with lower seats in comparison to the number of applicants. Thus, a higher number of students from the science stream are opting for engineering courses.

Udaykumar R Yaragatti, the director of Malaviya National Institute of Technology reasons the introduction of supernumerary seats has led to an increase in the number of enrolment of girls. “Courses such as computer science and electronic engineering has witnessed lower rate of enrolment of female students in NITs. Supernumerary seats have provisioned girls to pursue the highly coveted courses of engineering, he adds further.

The decrease in enrolment of JEE students

One of the primary reasons for the decrease in enrolment of students for JEE Main 2019 is the overlapping of JEE dates with class 12 board and practical exams, states Rajshekar Ratrey, Vice President of educational content in Toppr. He further adds as the students will be attempting the board exam after 2-3 months. The April session of JEE Mains 2019 is likely to witness higher registration.

Changes in JEE Main 2019

The HRD Ministry had announced several changes in the JEE Main. Candidates can attempt the examination twice a year once in January and other in April. The best score from either examination will be considered the final marks.

However, unlike the previous year, students will not have the option of attempting the examination by pen and paper mode. The examination will be conducted online through the computer-based mode. To get the students acquainted with the examination, the government has set more than 3,500 test centers across different states of the country. Candidates can enroll in these test centers and avail practice of the new format. However, the difficulty level of the examination will remain the same.

Furthermore, the examination will be conducted in 8 sittings and the students from different slots will be normalized to arrive the final score.

Impact of enrolment

The enrolment of students in JEE Mains 2019 is considered to increase as it will be held twice a year, rendering students twice the opportunity to attempt the exam. With two attempts of the exam, the chances of students getting a seat in JEE Mains is higher. The students can understand the patterns and aptitude before attempting the JEE paper in April.