CHENNAI: Though the number of students scoring high marks in Physics dropped this year, it may not result in a major change in cut-off marks during the counselling process for engineering admissions.
Experts say that the poor performance of students in Physics has been offset by improved performances in Chemistry and Mathematics, which has seen an increase in the number of people scoring centums.
Education consultant Jayaprakash Gandhi, who did an analysis of the cut-offs using official data, said that in cut-off calculations, where a weighted average is used for Maths, Chemistry and Physics, 35 people scored 200 on 200 when compared to 120 last year.
A total of 731 students have scored over 199 in 2012, while 1,174 students scored over 199 last year. Similarly, the corresponding number of students scoring over 195 this year and last year are 7,025 and 7,530 respectively.
Given these statistics, it is possible that the cut-off could dip between 0.5 to 2 marks depending on the range.
For example, for the range of 195-200, the cut-off is expected to go down by 0.5 marks compared to last year whereas for the less than 180 marks ra-nge, the corresponding dip is expected to be 2 marks.
This means if a course in a particular college was available for a student at a cut-off of 196.5 last year, those who scored 196 can expect to bag a seat this year.
However, officials at the Anna University, who requested anonymity, said these were only preliminary analyses and the actual cut-off might show variations.
On the medical front, Gandhi said the dip in cut-off would be barely 0.25 marks.