New Delhi: As part of its updated curriculum framework, the Ministry of Education has announced that board exams will now occur twice in a year, offering students the opportunity to sit for exams twice within a year. Notably, students will have the advantage of retaining their highest score among the attempts, media reports said.
In the National Curriculum Framework (NCF) for School Education, 2023, NCERT said that this will be made possible by creating a “comprehensive test item bank” which can be used to create tests using suitable software.
Gold Rate
Friday 14 Feb. 2025
This will enable the move towards a system of on demand examinations in the near future as envisioned in the NEP, it added.
On the current system of boards, NCF says that with one exam in a year, students do not have the chance to take it when they are ready, or a second chance to clear it if they miss the first opportunity.
About current challenges of board exams, the NCF states that it only focuses on the “capacity of students to reproduce learnt facts” which is not what exams are meant for. “Given that most examinations largely test rote memory, a very narrow range of competencies are assessed. This gives an incomplete (at best) or incorrect (at worst) picture of student learning,” the NCF read.
Instead, board exams should assess the achievement of competencies stated in the curriculum and provide a “valid and reliable picture of student performance”, it added.
The NCF states that the board will be responsible for designing and implementing a fair and reliable testing process and methods to assess achievements of competencies.
The framework also suggests that in Class 11 and 12, students will have to study two languages and one of them has to be an Indian language. The choice of subjects in classes 11 and 12 will not be restricted to streams such as Arts, Science and Commerce to get flexibility to choose, it added.
The new curriculum framework includes the following features:
· Board examinations will be conducted twice a year, providing students with two opportunities each year and the option to retain their highest score.
· Choice of subjects in classes 11, 12 will not be restricted to streams, students to get the flexibility to choose.
· Class 11, 12 students need to study two languages and at least one language must be Indian.
· Board exams will assess understanding and achievement of competencies over months of coaching and memorisation.
· The curriculum framework, aligned with the National Education Policy, is prepared for the introduction of new textbooks for the 2024 academic session.
At the Joint Workshop of National Curriculum Framework Oversight and NSTC Committee, Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan says, “Under the guidance of Kasturirangan, the steering committee has prepared the curriculum for the new National Education Policy. They submitted it to the government. The government gave it to the NCERT. NCERT has two committees, National Oversight Committee and National Syllabus and Textbook Committee (NSTC). We expect both these committees to prepare a syllabus according to the requirements of the 21st century and based on original Indian thinking.”
