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Can anyone suggest how to get better at solving Maths, specifically Probability and Statistics? I'm a first-year Engineering student in India preparing for an entrance exam to pursue a master's in Statistics from Indian Statistical Institute, Kolkata.

I'm doing self-study a lot lately, currently studying Probability theory from Sheldon Ross, and Solving its exercises. Apart from books, which are a lot of them out there, can someone give me some practical tips on how to be better at these subjects?

I've four years to prepare for this exam and am determined to put a lot of dedicated work and effort into this. This is the syllabus that I've to cover: ISI MStat Syllabus.

These are the question paper which has come in previous years: long QnA and MCQs

Just asking for some advice from all the experienced people out there who are willing to help out a little fella. Thank you for your time!

Abhisek Ganguly
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    As much as possible, try to understand rather than merely memorize. – littleO Mar 26 '22 at 06:13
  • Some of the many similar questions might help. In particular this one, perhaps. – Hans Lundmark Mar 26 '22 at 06:14
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    Answer questions on math.stackexchange. – Tobsn Mar 26 '22 at 06:22
  • @Tobsn: That's not really correct. If one is unfamiliar with a topic, one should not post answers to questions in that topic. Otherwise it would be detrimental to the quality of Math SE. To learn a topic, it's fine to post a question with an attempt at solution and tag it with [tag:solution-verification]. In fact, that is precisely what that tag is for! – user21820 Mar 26 '22 at 15:20
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    Thank you @user21820, I'm certain the solution-verification tag will prove to be useful for me in my learning journey. I didn’t know about it before. – Abhisek Ganguly Mar 26 '22 at 16:32
  • @user21820 Well, personally I take for granted that people do not answer question if they have no clue. Or in other words, I expect that people have been digging into the topic before they answer. Therefore the intension to answer questions on here, can be a great motivation for people to learn the stuff. Besides, I'm against the aggravating culture of badmouthing 'wrong answers'. Even a 'wrong answer' can contain enlightning insights. And as of now I think, we are having here far too many questions, and at the same time only few answers. – Tobsn Mar 26 '22 at 18:25
  • Therefore I would rather encourage people to try to answer more frequentely than only to ask new questions. – Tobsn Mar 26 '22 at 18:26
  • @Tobsn: It happens frequently enough that totally bogus answers by incompetent users get many upvotes (especially if they are old posts). If you encourage all users to post 'answers' just as long as they have been digging, it will severely reduce the quality of Math SE. Also, learning isn't restricted to unfamiliar topics; students can still answer questions in topics they are sufficiently familiar with. And if a student can be relatively certain that they have a logically watertight answer, even in a new topic, I would consider it fine to post answers. But if the student can't, then no. – user21820 Mar 26 '22 at 18:38
  • @user21 "And if a student can be relatively certain that they have a logically watertight answer, even in a new topic, I would consider it fine to post answers. But if the student can't, then no." We can agree upon that. – Tobsn Mar 26 '22 at 19:05
  • About mastering probability and statistics, pencil and paper study are one thing (in particular to be able to pass exams), but I strongly advise you to use the computer for doing extensive simulations (using random numbers). Personaly, I have learned a lot from them. – Jean Marie Apr 04 '22 at 21:47

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