MUMBAI: The 95% plus club of class X students seeking admission in first-year junior colleges (FYJC) in the Mumbai division has shot up by 25% this year.
The provisional merit list released for the 2.02 lakh FYJC aspirants has 4,745 students scoring 95% and above compared to last year’s 3,802. A total of 28 students on the merit list have bagged perfect 100%. Of these, 22 have opted for science, four for commerce, and two girls have chosen arts.
Among the 100% scorers, 24 are from the state board. Girls outshine boys among the top scorers with 23 getting 100%. This year, with no exams, results were based on internal assessment.
The number of students with 90% and above seeking FYJC admissions has dropped by 4% compared to last year. “A jump in 95% and drop in 90% could mean that the top-rung colleges may get students with higher scores,” said a principal. In an indication of what is in store for cut-offs in top-rung colleges, a student with the 100th rank had scored 98.6% last year; this year, the same rank corresponds to 99.2%. However, the corresponding scores for ranks below 10,000 have dropped this year, indicating that the cut-offs may eventually drop in the second round.
Kelkar-Vaze’s junior college vice-principal, Vidyadhar Joshi, said that the top-rung colleges may have slightly higher cut-offs or they may remain the same as there is only a marginal drop in 90%+ scorers. In the minority list released during the weekend, a few sought-after colleges have seen a drop in the cut-offs and in some others, they remained unchanged.
While a CBSE student with a 100% is in the number two position on the provisional merit list, the first ICSE student is in 45th position with 99.6%. The number one slot for FYJC admission has been taken by an SSC student wanting to pursue commerce. On number three is an Economically Weaker Section student with 100% wanting to join the science stream.
Since several students were bunching up with identical marks, the education department made use of date of birth as a tiebreaker. For instance, of two students with the same marks, the older one gets the higher rank. For students with the same marks and the same date of birth, the department made use of alphabetical order of the name and then the surname to decide the students’ position on the merit list. Corrections to the provisional merit list was carried out on Tuesday. The first merit list will be announced on August 27.
