The National Entrance Test for admission to Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS-NET), 2015 will be conducted on 10th January this year. TISS through its centres at Mumbai, Tuljapur, Guwahati and Hyderabad offers numerous programmes in the areas of social work, health, management, human resource, development, etc. The flagship programme of the institute is MA in Human Resource Management & Labor Relations is widely regarded as one of the best in the country.
The NET until 2012 was conducted in two phases. The first round was a common exam for all applicants and comprised 50 Multiple Choice Questions. The second round was the specific to the course applied for. TISS-NET is being conducted online since 2013 where there is only one common objective type test for all the courses. Test takers however have the option to take a pen paper format exam as well. The entrance examination comprises questions related to social awareness, general knowledge, Logical reasoning, Quantitative ability and English language.
As the applicants gear up to take the NET coming Saturday, here are a few pointers based on last year’s paper pattern and my experience which may be helpful:
TISSNET 2014:
- Total Number of questions: 95
- Time allotted: 100 minutes
- No Negative Marking
- 1 mark per question
Mathematical & Logical reasoning (35 questions, Easy)
This was the easiest section in the TISSNET 2014 paper. Most of the questions were sitters. Well prepared students could have easily scored more than 30 in this section. The questions were from various topics across the subject like TSD, Geometry, Permutation & Combination, Percentage, HCF & LCM, Syllogism, Odd one Out etc. One should allot around 40-45 minutes to this section.
Suggestion: Though considered very easy, this section can have few tricky ones. Be careful and act judiciously. Remember if it is easy, it is easy for all.
General Awareness (30 questions, This is the Key Section, Moderate to Difficult)
This was the toughest section in the entire exam. Questions were distributed equally between static and current GK and from a variety of topics like Indian and World History, Important Dates, Authors, Awards, Geography, Politics, Literature etc. Ideal time duration for this section would be around 25-30 minutes and a score of 15 plus would be considered good.
Suggestion: This section is highly unpredictable. Anything and everything under the sun can be asked. One should not rely on previous year trends and prepare comprehensively.
English Proficiency (30 questions, Easy to Moderate)
The English Proficiency section was also of a fairly easy level. The questions included reading comprehension passages, analogies, fill in the blanks, choosing the appropriate word, parajumbles, synonym-antonym etc. Five questions of reading comprehension carried 2 marks each. A score of 28 would be considered good and ideal time duration for this section would be 30-35 minutes.
Suggestion: No such surprise element observed in this section in the last two years. Milk your scores in this section and avoid silly mistakes.
Final Tips:
There is no section time limit and therefore once can switch freely within sections within the stipulated time. There is sufficient time to analyze each question carefully and hence accuracy is the key here.
- The exam is very easy for the ones who have prepared for CAT.
- The GK section is mostly the deciding factor for a call.
- There has been no sectional cutoffs till last year and we can expect the trend to continue.
- Erroneous questions and technical glitches in the computer system have been observed in the previous years at certain centers. Do not panic.
- There is no negative marking hence one can take a calculated guess.
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