Where each aspirant has a mentor

Continuous and Comprehensive Evaluation (CCE) System is now an important feature of Right to Education Act (RTE). As a holistic assessment system, it aims to develop skills of students in all areas. But left to the discretion of a single teacher are a big group of students where “intelligent feedback” may not always happen. Another prominent issue is the unpredictability in the difference of scores while taking massively competitive complex exams (MCCE) like JEE Main, JEE Advanced for Indian Institute of Technology entrance exams, unlike GRE or GMAT practice tests which are reasonably certain about their final score.

Looking at the gaps, a former corporate employee, Aditi Avasthi decided to set up edtech start-up Embibe that combines data sciences and online technology to help students prepare better for MCCE and with a continuous assessment that may not have much deviation from the final test score. “Edtech is the only way to solve, create a true demographic dividend which can pioneer analytics in a big way,” says the founder and CEO.

Calling herself, a ‘chief Embiber’, she says, “The idea was create a data sciences’ recommendation engine where best of faculty, one-to-one guidance and equal opportunity can be given to the students.”

Founded in 2012, the portal is the “only consumer tech data analytics company with a focus on MCCE” and the “science of scoring” through measuring critical exam performance metrics like speed, accuracy, time management, attempt planning, stamina and addressing psychological factors like confidence.

Currently, the portal has 2,20,000 students taking its tests. Once a test is complete, the company’s analytics engine provides feedback on a host of factors — the average time a student spent on a question, the questions that were solved at one go, what concepts were consistently answered wrong.

Over ten tests, she points out they have seen a noticeable improvement in scores. “We have been able to match our predicted scores to a candidate’s final score at the JEE with 92 percent accuracy,” Avasthi tells Metrolife.

An engineer herself, 33-year-old is a MBA from Booth School of Business in Chicago. As a person who “enjoys challenges”, she went on to try diverse fields such as marketing, product innovation and mobile commerce, across four continents including Africa.

With a small 50-member team preparing the test material without any classrooms, Embibe has now partnered with Abhayanand Super30, a social initiative for underprivileged students known for its top scores in engineering examinations. “We partnered in 2014 just a month before JEE 2014. This year, we went pan India and achieved unprecedented 50 per cent success rate in JEE Advanced 2015,” says Avasthi.

Now, the platform is completely free of cost across all the centres of Abhayanand Super30. A test series for students in classes 8, 9 and 10 is next on agenda.

However, scale up in 450 odd start-ups and coursewares in the education sector including MOOCs (Massive Open Online Courses) is a big challenge but she is confident to face it. “You (aspirants) may know that you are good. But our philosophy, vision and practice is to provide super-detailed information of exactly how good you are at your attempts,” says Avasthi.