Neil Buddy Shah (left) and Rakesh Prakash at the seminar in Patna on Sunday. Picture by Ranjeet Kumar Dey

The desire to dream big and the patience to work for it would bring success one’s way, said entrepreneur Irfan Alam, an alumnus of Columbia University, New York.

Alam, the chairman of Samman Foundation, was one of the speakers at a seminar on Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT) on Sunday. Around 200 students attended the seminar at LN Mishra Institute of Economic Development and Social Change to understand the key to SAT, a standardised test for college examinations in the United States of America.

Among other speakers were Harvard University graduate Neil Buddy Shah and Patna youths — Sharad Vivek Sagar, who has been selected for an undergraduate programme at Tufts University, Boston, and Barsa, who has been selected for an undergraduate programme at Columbia University.

Sharad said: “Students who want to study at the American universities first need to discover why they want to do so. If you are not clear in your ambition, you will not be able to focus on the goal.” He said the US universities were one of the best in the world, as the students have good resources, good faculty and good learning environment.

“Students from all over the world go to the US. If one takes admission to an American university, he or she will be surrounded by intellectuals from across the world.”

Neil, an Ivy League graduate, stressed on the flexibility of the US varsities. He said: “I had enrolled in the pre-medical course at Harvard but then discovered my love for economics. So I studied both the courses — this flexibility cannot be found at any other university in the world. The American universities bring out the best in their students.”

IIT, Roorkee, alumnus Rakesh Prakash, the founder of Nirmaan Foundation that had organised the seminar, said: “Foreign universities look for certain things in their students, like their profile. They see whether a student is good in extracurricular activities or not. Participation in extracurricular activities is a huge plus for a student, who wants to take admission in any American university. While applying for SAT, a student needs to give genuine reasons for seeking admission in a particular university.”