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How to choose an engineering college?

No matter what your scores are, choosing the best engineering college can be a hassle for any student of science. Listed below are a few things you can take care of before making that choice.

Now that the results of engineering entrance exams are out, it is time to go through the most important stage in your admission process the counselling. It is this stage that decides which college and which branch you are going to get.

Though a subsequent change is possible, it is subject to a lot of conditions. Hence students whose rankings aren't that good, will really have a tough time now. When the rank is in thousands and you have to select one from hundred ordinary institutes, mistakes are bound to happen. 

With the number of engineering colleges rising with every academic year, getting admission is not that big a problem. What is important is getting admission to a good institute in the branch of your choice.

So preparation for counselling can be divided into two parts first is to know about the process of counselling and enough home work to be done in advance so that you can take the right decision. Most of the counselling process is done online but processes differ.

Prepare yourself before counselling 
As soon as the result of the written test is out, you will come to know about your rank, and you can easily guess in which branch and institution you can get admission.

In counselling, candidates are called according to their rank and are told to write down their priorities of branch and college. Candidates with higher ranking are first given seat of their choice, and your fate for the seats will be decided by the seats left and your ranking. So before going for counselling, decide the priority order of the institute and branch.

Important thing to note here is that your priorities should be in accordance with your rank. If the choice of your institute and branch doesn't match your rank, mentioning it will be of no use.

How to decide your priority

It's a tradition that before granting admission in IITs, the students are informed about work sphere, nature and career opportunities of all the engineering branches. This helps students get a clear picture to make choices according their aptitude, employment opportunities and possible demand for future professionals of that particular branch.

In the same way, you can mention your priorities on the basis of placement record of the institute, fees, faculty and last two years' cut-off. AIEEE's opening and closing ranks' information is available on the respective websites.

Saurabh Kumar, senior faculty member at Vidya Mandir, which conducts coaching classes for engineering entrance exam, says, "Don't give a thought to college about which no information is available, and which is situated in a remote area. Choose old and established colleges over ordinary ones."

In AIEEE institutes preference should be given to National Institutes of Technology, after that to government engineering colleges or engineering departments of reputed deemed universities. Remember there is a difference between old and new IITs.

If you find it difficult to get admission in an old institute, then your priority should be the branch of your choice. Chances of getting good college in AIEEE is there when your rank is within 10,000 and you can make it to an IIT only if your rank is within 4,500. Ranking published by different magazines can also be helpful.

During counselling

IIT-JEE: This entrance examination is held for 15 IITs, ISM-Dhanbad, IT, BHU. There are more than 100 Engineering graduate and integrated courses to choose from.

Important documents: JEE counselling will be completely online and candidate need not go to IITs but some documents have to be sent before July 10. You can download application form from the counselling portal. Apart from this, one medical fitness report, two attested photo copies of marksheet of qualifying exam and for quota seats, you will have to send attested photo copy of caste certificate.

Mention of choice filling or priority: After doing registration and paying fees you will have to mention your priority about institute and branch. This process is known as choice filling. In JEE you can fill more than 100 choices, but your choice will be allotted to you, only if it is vacant. Last year's opening and closing rank can give you an idea of where you stand.

IIT Delhi's assistant registrar Atul Vyas says, "Go carefully through JEE's website and its counselling portal. You can find counselling brochure and last two years' opening and closing ranks. You can also find the guidelines about counselling process here."

Admission offer may be accepted till July 1. Before July 1, you will have to deposit Rs. 40,000 through ATM or NEFT as registration fee. Untill then, watch out if you are getting a better offer through another engineering entrance exam counselling. After first round of allotment final allotment announcement for vacant seats will be done on July 6.

Parameters to consider

AIEEE: For 27,000 seats, nearly 10 lakh candidates try their luck here. According to performance in entrance test, all candidates will be given state-level rank. Candidates getting more marks than a certain cut-off will be called for counselling.

Online registration: This also will be an online counselling, which will be conducted through http://www.ccb.in. Priority about institute and branch can be filled up till June 23. Institutes of AIEEE, availability of branch, cut-off, and last two years' opening closing is available on http://ccb.nic.in/ccb2011/home.htm.

Allotment of seats: Based on the all India ranking of the candidate, first round of the allotment of seat will be on June 25. Candidates getting a seat will have to report at a scheduled centre for verification of their documents between June 26 and July 2. If one doesn't get seat in first round, then there will be second round on July 5, third round on July 13, fourth round on July 25 and fifth round on August 2 for allotment of seats.

Freedom to change the decision: In AIEEE, there is a provision to change the decision after allotment. If a candidate wishes so, he can refuse the offer even in the third round and reserve his claim for next round, If one doesn't get seat even in fifth round, then, at regional centres, one can claim for vacant seats during spot round, which will be between August 11 and 13. This way, AIEEE's counselling will be complete in many stages.

Similarly, different states have different counselling procedures. Some do it completely online (like JEE) and some expect to go to a central facility (like Tamil Nadu). Some have a mix of both online and offline model. Whichever be the case ensure that your preparation is thorough and your choices have sufficient alternatives.

Parameters for selection of College

• Quality of faculty
• Faculty research
• Ratio of Professors to Lecturers or Asst. Professors
• Infrastructure
• Lab Facilities and instructors
• Curriculum diversity and updation
• Placements