New Delhi: Super 30 is among the most successful training programmes for students hoping to make the grade at the joint entrance examination (JEE) for the Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs), the country’s elite engineering schools.

Every year, 30 promising students are selected and trained under the programme, run out of the Ramanujan School of Mathematics, a small academy based in Patna.

Click here to view Super 30 Alumini

In the eight years since it was launched, as many as 212 of its 240 candidates have entered the IITs. This includes the entire batch of 30 students for each of the past three years. Super 30 has been featured in ‘Time’ magazine’s Best of Asia 2010 list.

Anand Kumar, a mathematician who couldn’t study abroad because of financial constraints, runs Super 30.

What makes the programme stand out is the fact that Kumar selects students exclusively from poor backgrounds—who have no other chance of getting through to the IITs—and provides them free tuitions, boarding and lodging.

‘Mint’ catches up with some of the alumni of Super 30 who have now graduated from the IITs as well.

aparna.k@livemint.com