Difficulty level of pre-IPhO exams in india.

In summary, the conversation discusses the individual's preparation for the Physics Olympiad in India and their concerns about the difficulty level and which books and question sets to use for preparation. They also discuss the selection process for the Indian team for the International Physics Olympiad and compare it to other countries. The conversation also touches upon the number of high schools in India and the importance of olympiad medals for admission to US universities.
  • #1
n10Newton
108
0
my basics and concepts in physics are relatively the best among my classmates but i have not done expected amount of problems that require IPhO. i am from India and first level NSEP is on 25 november 2012 so i have about 100 days for problem practice. I have collected the following books - 1.sears and zymnasky university physics, 2.resnick halliday FOP, 3.serway jewet Physics for scientist and engineers ,4.jacson's classic electrodynamics, 5.Feynman lectures on physics, 6.I E Irodov problems in general physics, 7.S S Krotov problem in physics
and following question sets of olympiad - 1.asian physics olympiad, 2.international physics olympiad, 3.indian national physics olympiad , 4.canadian POPTOR series and national olympiads of britain, USA, Canada and australia.
but till today i have done only textbook excercise and H C Verma concepts of Physics. Please suggest which book and question sets are of same difficulty level as NSEP in India so i solve those before NSEP and the rest after that.Thanks in advace. Congratulations to all Gold Medalist of IPhO 2012.
 
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  • #2
The first stage is pretty easy (AIEEE level) although remember that it covers the complete syllabus of both class 11 and 12. The second level might give you some trouble although I suppose you have a chance if you can easily solve problems from Irodov's and Krotov's books. I can't say anything about the international paper.
 
  • #3
Phew! If its of AIEEE level, i may get through the first stage.
 
  • #4
First stage of physics olympiad in India is a mix of both good and easy questions. Objective type questions are quite easy for the person who has taken IIT JEE's coaching and some are formula based but that formula , you cannot find in NCERT books. More than one questions are 10 and appear easy (and actually are) if you have good command over problems and theory . and then come subjective questions which can be quite tricky and can also be of old iit subjective questions. As for aieee type questions, indeed there are some but doing them only cannot assure you to crack 1st level And as for books, HC Verma is a good choice ( for aieee type , theory related, and a few formula related questions) Buit there is no need to go for feynman lectures for it now ( believe me) . However Irodov can be quite useful.
Well, looking at the previous level and questions from past exams of first level , I would strongly recommend you to focus mainly on mechanics, fluid mechanics, elasticity and viscosity ,SHM, Waves , and electrostatics. For more practive, and to have a better idea about the difficulty of exam start solving past years' papers. past year paper and answer4 key is below:http://aryanclasses.com/NSE/INO-2012/INPhO-2012-questions.pdf and ak http://aryanclasses.com/NSE/INO-2012/inpho-2012-solutions.pdf
 
  • #5
hey , i am from India , class 10th and saw the advert in the newspaper . I was thinking of applying for NSEP ,but i fear that my knowledge might not be enough.Can i a 15 year old guy crack this ,or should i wait a few years ? I am enrolled in FIITJEE and can say that my physics is quite good :)
 
  • #6
at sambarbarian , just prepare well. usually no one write NSEP in 10 grade. wait for a year. write it in 11th grade. one more advantage of writing it in 11th is ,in asian physics olympiad students of 11th grade get periority.
 
  • #7
Actually, I´m curious about how many levels you have to go through.

All countries have 5 places in the IPhO, avout July - regardless of population. This is the same for China with over 1,3 milliard people, India with over 1,2 milliard people, and my country with under 1,3 million.

In my country, there are 3 stages of olympiad:
1st stage is held in schools, November-December
2nd stage is county level. Usually some Saturday in January. Normally the contest committee who does the marking consists of the physics teachers of the schools of the county.
3rd stage is the national olympiad, Normally in March. The contest committee is from university.
Then there are 10...20 better students selected for study sessions, like 2 sessions of a week each. Followed by contest among themselves and a final selection of the team of 5.

How does India select their 5 team members out of their whole school population?
 
  • #8
snorkack said:
Actually, I´m curious about how many levels you have to go through.

All countries have 5 places in the IPhO, avout July - regardless of population. This is the same for China with over 1,3 milliard people, India with over 1,2 milliard people, and my country with under 1,3 million.

In my country, there are 3 stages of olympiad:
1st stage is held in schools, November-December
2nd stage is county level. Usually some Saturday in January. Normally the contest committee who does the marking consists of the physics teachers of the schools of the county.
3rd stage is the national olympiad, Normally in March. The contest committee is from university.
Then there are 10...20 better students selected for study sessions, like 2 sessions of a week each. Followed by contest among themselves and a final selection of the team of 5.

How does India select their 5 team members out of their whole school population?

Hi snorkack. Yes we in India follow pretty much the same procedure.
 
  • #9
mishrashubham said:
Hi snorkack. Yes we in India follow pretty much the same procedure.

How?

In my country, with slightly over 200 high schools, the 15 counties are reasonable for 3 levels of olympiad (school, county, national).

How many high schools exist in India?
 
  • #10
In India there are 200+ School Boards and very few are Recognised Internationally so Advance Placements and Olympiads Medals are Required to take admission in US universities. And this is the reason why all senior year high school students go for olympiad and due to low selection ratio stages are more than 3.
 
  • #11
snorkack said:
How?

In my country, with slightly over 200 high schools, the 15 counties are reasonable for 3 levels of olympiad (school, county, national).

How many high schools exist in India?

Oops my mistake. I read county to be country. First we have the Regional level selection (we have 29 states and a certain number of students are selected from each in proportion to the population of that state). The total number of people selected for Level 2 is around 300. Then there is a national level selection and 35 are further selected. Then there is a training camp for these 35 and one more exam which includes theory and practicals, by which the final international team is decided.

As for the number of schools, I don't know, but I'm pretty sure the figure would be something in hundreds of thousands or may be more. But the number of schools participating in the olympiads would be less than that.
 
  • #12
mishrashubham said:
Oops my mistake. I read county to be country. First we have the Regional level selection (we have 29 states and a certain number of students are selected from each in proportion to the population of that state). The total number of people selected for Level 2 is around 300.

But the States are themselves huge!

The population of Uttar Pradesh is 200 millions, Maharashtra 112 millions, Bihar 104 millions.

This means about 1 participant of the national level Olympiad per 4 million population... How is the Uttar Pradesh or Bihar team selected for the national olympiad? And how do students get so far as to get considered on the State level?
 
  • #13
snorkack said:
But the States are themselves huge!

The population of Uttar Pradesh is 200 millions, Maharashtra 112 millions, Bihar 104 millions.

This means about 1 participant of the national level Olympiad per 4 million population... How is the Uttar Pradesh or Bihar team selected for the national olympiad? And how do students get so far as to get considered on the State level?

Yes since we have so many people, the competition is pretty tough. But I don't think it's that much since not all science students in the country give the olympiads.

For the first stage we just have one national paper i.e. the paper is the same all over the country and from which a total of about 300 are selected but in proportion to the state's population for example, Maharashtra gets 65 people while Andaman and Nicobar islands have only one student.
 
  • #14
mishrashubham said:
For the first stage we just have one national paper i.e. the paper is the same all over the country and from which a total of about 300 are selected but in proportion to the state's population for example, Maharashtra gets 65 people

Which is out of proportion - in proportion would be about 1 per 4 millions, whish is for Maharashtra 28, and for Bihar 26.

But how many people sit that state-level paper in, for example, Maharashtra (where 65 get to the 300 of national olympiad)?
 
  • #15
About 3 to 5 lakhs Appears in First Test(National Qualifier) held on November, 300 and some more where marks are same and others who appeared any International Olympiad or Before are Welcomed to 2nd stage (Quaterfinals) held January Last or February First Week, 35 Students Selected and go to Semifinal camp in Apr-May. after that 5 Selected.

only 3 students from Bihar were selected in First test.(Indian system take view on application not population 1000 application then 1)
 
  • #16
n10Newton said:
About 3 to 5 lakhs Appears in First Test(National Qualifier) held on November, 300 and some more where marks are same and others who appeared any International Olympiad or Before are Welcomed to 2nd stage (Quaterfinals) held January

Ah, thanks.

So a single stage to select 300 out of 3 to 5 lakhs. Just 1 out of 1000 or 1700 gets ahead.

How did you fare at the Olympiad?
 
  • #17
Also in India Physics Olympiad is just a joke, just an Exam. because no one going to take Undergraduate in Physics.
 
  • #18
In my country, the annual admission to undergraduate programs of Physics is, between the 3 universities, about 120.
 
  • #19
n10Newton said:
only 3 students from Bihar were selected in First test.(Indian system take view on application not population 1000 application then 1)

Yes, I suppose that explains the numbers.

snorkack said:
Ah, thanks.

So a single stage to select 300 out of 3 to 5 lakhs. Just 1 out of 1000 or 1700 gets ahead.

How did you fare at the Olympiad?

Um yes that's it. I appeared for Physics, Chemistry and Biology olympiads but qualified only for Biology (although I was confident that I'd get through chemistry as well). The next level in on the 3rd of February.
 
  • #20
I will , I love physics .

udergraduate in physics , that is ...
 
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  • #21
n10Newton said:
Also in India Physics Olympiad is just a joke, just an Exam. because no one going to take Undergraduate in Physics.


You may not know it but some people don't just view physics as a ladder for a better life and to do engineering in foreign universities. To some Physics is something more. Even in India.
 
  • #22
mishrashubham said:
I appeared for Physics, Chemistry and Biology olympiads but qualified only for Biology (although I was confident that I'd get through chemistry as well). The next level in on the 3rd of February.
How did you fare?
 
  • #23
Hey guyies, m new to this topic, I'm also from india
and m currently preparing for iit jee, finished my 12th this year, I'm very much interested in physics and want to study physics all the way till phd,
can i know what is this nsep exam all about? Just a brief introduction
 
  • #24
Viru.universe said:
Hey guyies, m new to this topic, I'm also from india
and m currently preparing for iit jee, finished my 12th this year, I'm very much interested in physics and want to study physics all the way till phd,
can i know what is this nsep exam all about? Just a brief introduction

Too late for you. The olympiads are intended for children who are still in high school.

I´ll again present a comparison from my country.

In this spring, the total number of 12th year graduates in my country is about 12 000.
The total number of vacancies in the physics departments, between 3 universities, is 120.

Based on the local physics olympiads held in January, the national jury invited 120 students to the national competition.

Of these 120, 11 did not show up. In my country, there were 2 different exams, held at the same time. One for high school, one for junior high (intended as years 8 and 9). It was possible for junior high students to opt to sit the high school exams. 2 of them did so, thus there were 59 participants in high school exam, and 50 in the junior high exam.

The number of participants by year was:
29 in year 12
13 in year 11
15 in year 10
the 2 junior high students (one from year 9 and the other from 8) who competed in high school exam both fared ahead of whole year 10
32 in year 9
17 in year 8
1 year 7 student on junior high exam, got place 8 from 18 8th year students

Based on the results, the candidates for the international olympiad were selected - 1 place given for certain, and 21 candidates for the other 4 places, to be decided by extra exam after a training camp.

The certain representative was 12th year (and won the whole high school).
The 21 candidates were:
11 from year 12
4 from year 11
3 from year 10
1 year 9 competing in high school
1 year 8 competing in high school
1 year 9 competing in junior high (the junior high winner)

So... over the whole India, just 35 students get invited to extra training?
 
  • #25
snorkack said:
So... over the whole India, just 35 students get invited to extra training?

Yes unfotunately-

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Standard_Examination_in_Physics

Most of those selected are rankers in IITJEE proving that performers in physics can perform in chemistry and mathematics also!. India team is quite strong some students win gold medals also.
 
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1. What is the difficulty level of pre-IPhO exams in India?

The difficulty level of pre-IPhO exams in India can vary depending on the year and the specific exam. Generally, they are considered to be quite challenging and require a strong understanding of physics concepts and problem-solving skills. However, with adequate preparation and practice, many students are able to perform well on these exams.

2. Are the pre-IPhO exams in India harder than the actual IPhO?

It is difficult to compare the difficulty level of the pre-IPhO exams to the actual IPhO, as they serve different purposes. The pre-IPhO exams are meant to prepare students for the IPhO and may have similar question formats and topics, but the actual IPhO is a much more rigorous and comprehensive exam.

3. What topics are typically covered in pre-IPhO exams in India?

Pre-IPhO exams in India typically cover a wide range of physics topics, including mechanics, thermodynamics, electromagnetism, optics, and modern physics. It is important for students to have a strong understanding of these fundamental concepts in order to do well on the exams.

4. How can I prepare for pre-IPhO exams in India?

To prepare for pre-IPhO exams in India, it is important to have a strong foundation in physics concepts and to practice solving problems. You can also refer to past exams and study materials provided by the Indian Association of Physics Teachers (IAPT) to get a better idea of the format and difficulty level of the exams.

5. Are there any tips for performing well on pre-IPhO exams in India?

Some tips for performing well on pre-IPhO exams in India include starting your preparation early, practicing regularly, and seeking help from teachers or peers if you encounter any difficulties. It is also important to stay calm and focused during the exam and to manage your time effectively.

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