7,000 people to sit for NED university’s entrance test today

Only a quarter of them will be made admission offers

KARACHI: The grueling competition for a spot in NED University of Engineering and Technology’s class of 2017 is on. Around 7,855 people will sit for the two-hour entrance test on Saturday (today). But only a quarter of them will be made offers to attend classes at the institution next fall.

The test will begin at 10 am at the convocation ground located inside the university’s main campus. Students have been asked to be at the venue an hour before the starting time. The anxious hopefuls have also been told to bring admit cards, pens, pencils, erasers and scientific calculators for the test.

The deputy director of admissions, Dr Amir Iqbal, told The Express Tribune that the answer key will be immediately uploaded on the university’s website after the test so that people can gauge their performances. The students won’t have to wait long for the actual results - they will be available the same evening.

For this admission cycle, the university had increased the passing mark from 40 to 50. While discussing the eligibility criteria, the university’s registrar, Javed Aziz Khan, told The Express Tribune that final offers will be based on students’ performance in the intermediate exams.

The institution, unlike others, does not use a person’s performance on the test to make admission offers - it merely has to be cleared. For this reason, most students consider the test a formality. But this time, things will be tougher because they need 10 more marks. The institution currently teaches 23 disciplines.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 6^th, 2012.