Chennai: As many as 50,000 Indians take the Graduate Record Examination (GRE) every year but many flounder - not because of lack of knowledge but because they are not used to taking computer based tests. Now, GRE training has gone online, enabling students to be better prepared.

The GRE is an online, timed test that qualifies a person to get admission to American universities and is considered a proficiency benchmark by several other countries and international institutions.

On Wednesday, Valued Epistemics Pvt. Ltd (VEPL) launched greedge.com, India's first online training for GRE aspirants.

"The online test was put on public domain after thorough research and development since 2005," says Anand Kannan, managing director of VEPL.

As many as 15,000 successful candidates have passed through its portals during its development process on its technology platform wizdom.in.

"The inherent advantage of an online platform is that students can learn at their own pace and convenience, making it truly an anywhere, anytime learning", he added.

The programme is supported by a feature called The Millisecond Technology, a software that captures information on how students answer questions, analyses the data and offers them feedback and recommendations to boost their score. This technology is pending patent.

"In an online test environment - where every millisecond counts for scoring, this technology plays a crucial role in helping students boost their scores," said Yogish Lavanis, director of students facilitation at VEPL.

Another key advantage of greedge.com is that the student counsellor understands the time available and the student's specific skills to customise a programme which both can adhere to easily. This mentoring facility is available in person as well as over the telephone.

Anyone who enrols in greedge.com is assigned a Student Facilitator and Analyst (SFA) who guides the student through the entire duration of the preparation for GRE.

"There are two aspects to the functioning of Millisecond Technology - data capturing and analysis. The most important difference is that it does the analysis in real-time," said Lavanis.

When students log on to greedge.com and start working on GRE model tests, the Millisecond Monitor, which is embedded on the page, records the way students select their answers. With the help of predictive analytics technology, the data is "sliced and diced".

The information the SFAs gather about the student's behaviour from this process is then crystallised into intelligent feedback on their strengths and weaknesses, helping them understand where they are losing time and help them in correcting it.

About 120 hours of training comes at a cost of Rs.6,000 at present. Details of how to register for online GRE test training can be found at the website www.greedge.com. (IANS)