No marks for SSC

The state government on Friday decided to introduce grading system in the SSC public examinations from this academic year and do away with the announcement of marks.

At present, the CBSE and ICSE Boards follow grading method in Class X exams and the Board of Intermediate Education is also doing the same in Inter exams.

“There will be no marks in the SSC public exams to be held in March 2010,” said the minister for secondary education, Mr Manikya Vara Prasada Rao. “We will announce grades for students based on their performance.”

Talking to mediapersons after releasing the SSC advanced supplementary exam results at the Secretariat, Mr Prasada Rao said that the department of school education was examining the grading methods adopted by ICSE and CBSE Boards to finalise the system to be adopted in the state.

“We want to take the best procedures from ICSE and CBSE and prepare a separate grading method that can take care of the future challenges which students will face,” he said. “We will come out with the guidelines shortly.”

The government has also decided to have bar codes in answer scripts of all subjects from this year. Last year, bar coding was implemented for four subjects barring language papers.

Bar-coding will protect the identity of students and schools and prevent complaints of awarding more marks for some students and schools. Such complaints have been on the rise in the last few years.

“It will enable us to check irregularities during valuation of papers,” said the minister. “As bar-coding proved to be effective last year, though implemented only for some subjects, we have decided to extend the facility to all the subjects this year.”

The government has also decided to provide photocopies of answer sheets to students to ensure transparency in valuation process on the lines of Intermediate exams.

“To begin with, the facility will be available for language subjects this year,” said Mr Prasada Rao.

“Later, we will extend it to all subjects. Students need to pay Rs 500 per subject to avail this facility.”