Today, Mr Pokhriyal held a live interaction with teachers on the upcoming board exams after which Union Education Minister Ramesh Pokhriyal ‘Nishank’ today said that the coming CBSE board exams will not be held until February 2021. A decision on when to start the exams will be taken by the government later, he added. Prior to this, he had interacted with students regarding entrance exams and online classes.
Teachers across the country have been sharing their concerns and suggestions on Twitter by using #EducationMinisterGoesLive. Their main concerns are regarding upcoming CBSE and state board syllabus, exam patterns and exam dates. The government has not shared the schedule for the CBSE Board examinations 2021 till now which has been making students and their parents anxious.
“The Classes 10 and 12 CBSE board exams 2021 will not be held in January and February. The exact exam schedule will be decided after February 2021,” said Ramesh Pokhriyal.
Pokhriyal also said that the decision to conduct the examinations will be taken later. “The current scenario is inconducive for exams,” he added.
“Cancelling exams and promoting students without exams will put a stamp on these students. These students might face trouble in getting jobs and admissions at higher education level in future as they would be termed as COVID-era students. We do not want that for our students,” he added.
The Minister said that the exam will be conducted offline as ‘we need a laptop and stable internet and electricity for each student which is a challenge.’
“A percentage of students do not have equal access to education. While we have used unique methods to teach students but having such methods for exams might not be fair,” he said.
The CBSE board exams will be conducted on a reduced syllabus. There will also be 33% internal choices in the exam, said Pokhiryal. 30% of the total syllabus has been scrapped and some states have also declared the same while others are likely to make an announcement soon.
Education Minister said, “CBSE has trained 4.80 lakh teachers in online education teaching. Training of teachers in online education is critical. Schools are yet to resume to their full capacities. Several platforms like ‘Nishtha’ has been launched for the benefit of teachers.”
“NCERT has been providing online content. Various regional schools and educational boards have uploaded their curriculum on DIKSHA platform”, Mr Pokhriyal added.
In the webinar, Education Minister highlighted how the teachers have stepped up and helped students in the time of the pandemic. He also pointed out that teachers even used innovative means of teaching through walls, travelling to their homes and teaching from rooftops.
Meanwhile, the clarity on the exam dates has brought some respite to the teachers. “Courses are complete, schools are closed and students are waiting for exams to be postponed! There is no clarity on whether exams would be pushed to May or would it be the end of March or the usual! Giving some date is very important,” points out Mrs. Rai, Principal, AIS. Reacting to the announcement of no practicals in Jan and Feb, she said that it was a wise decision as students were still not back in classes.
Among other requests from students is to cancel the Class 10 board examinations. Bihar Board students have also reached out to Education Minister, seeking a delay in the dates. With the discussion focussed on board exams, it is expected that the Pokhriyal may announce the dates or the decision on whether or not the exams would be postponed.
