It is true that when one has a regulatory body that's bound to be affected by political and geographical factors and its very own establishment affected by the ruling party at the centre, there will be little hope of game changing policies, insights, implementations, and research that such a regulatory body will get into. One look at such bodies (even in the developed nations like the US) will give us an idea that such politically backed institutions have never thought about the real problems of education and have never even tried to provide solutions that are revolutionary,
The latest in its kitty dished out to management institutions, Universities, and State governments has been the CMAT which is to be used for admission into MBA/PGDM programs of institutions approved by the AICTE. In 2011 itself, there were announcements of other tests like - FMS Delhi entrance test, JMET entrance, and the MAT - being put to rest. MAT's last run is for this year and from next year on, the entire system that was banking on MAT scores will have to look into either CAT or CMAT.
I have many issues of the regulatory body implementing a new test - they have reasoned that, its for the betterment of students that so many tests are being taken-out and that they don't trust the validity of some of these tests (a reason why the court asked them to go for their own test if they felt the need for one). My issue is also on the objectives of this whole process and that it begs the question - Why is this test being so swiftly implemented from this year without any thought given into the usage, learning, training, infra, etc and Why are people being forced to accept the test at all levels?
One look at the history of any successful product (in this case, lets consider this test as a product) has been the way it was introduced to particular sections of the userbase and then it made its way through to the larger database by its own merit. Is AICTE scared that this acceptance will not happen with CMAT? Or does it have other vested interests?
Google, Apple, and host of other companies have been successful by following a simple principle. They designed products that were introduced to a selected bunch of users (namely - innovators and early adopters), and then the product made its way through these early adopters to the larger userbase, who now form the majority of the market share for all of their products. This is true for all products and services, and I am sure GMAT's history will also showcase a similar trend - of being accepted by the early adopters and then going global with its test. The stategy was never to force implementation to the masses, because thats where the backlash and resistance to change is. The masses are the ones that can ignore anything that is implemented only through them and lets face it - we have everyday examples in our lives to support this statement.
A blanket implementation strategy (and that too a forced one) reeks of other anomalies on the part of AICTE and doesn't really give out any signal that any execution level thought process backed with intelligent strategies have even been considered. This isn't surprising, because none of the current members of the regulatory body or the core team are acknowledged anywhere in the world as game changing thinkers. The motivation doesn't seem to be there to atleast replicate the best systems across the world and move forward, as much as it seems to follow what their bosses in the Government think makes sense. This is very sad, and there seems to be no hope of this changing very soon.
Another factor that needs to be understood here is the whole validity of this test. We have seen in the past 3 years' performance of CAT (when it went into the online format) and the kind of shameful glitches that marred its performance as a test. We are aware that there wasn't a raw test study done before the tests were administered to even come up with proper tests for applicants, and there were no answers given to many of the questions related to the validity of their flawed normalization process. For CMAT, where is the Raw test study? How did they figure out the ways to solve the problems that affected CAT as a test? Why did the lowest bidder get the job to design the supposedly largest process for MBA applicants? Were the qualities of choosing the vendor based on pricing benefits or were important test development factors taken into consideration? Who are the experts behind the developmental team and the team? Who is the singlemost Accountable person for all failures (if any) in case of CMAT?
By the looks of the first version of the test that came on LIVE for applicants, there are enough reasons to feel scared and disgruntled about this entire process. The Government will force the thing down the throats of our institutions (without doubt), because thats the way its structured, and because we are sovereign. But this doesn't look good for our country and its talent, which is already producing a soft underbelly that's not-tech-savvy and aren't fit to work in the job roles of the coming future. We are seeing some of the worst job losses across the world (including the developed economies), and given the trends catch up soon, are we ready to face the world with this kind of regulations and implementations that have the power to castrate the entire education system and make things difficult from where we are now?
According to my analysis, the CMAT in its current form, will be a nightmare if it's pushed down forcefully into the system. The AICTE needs to get its act together and follow the implementation rules that have made some of the best products and companies in this world successful, and then get the right people to design the test (and not the lowest bidder).
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