Mita Mukherjee

The 2023 ISC examinations are round the corner and several schools are noticing that many students including the meritorious ones who will be appearing in the Class XII board test are anxious and stressed out as this will be their first public exam. A series of measures are being implemented by the schools to make the students ready to write the test without difficulty.

Many students among the 2023 Class XII batch are suffering from the anxiety because they did not have to write the Class X board exam in 2021 as all boards had cancelled the tests because of the surge in Covid -19 at that time and students were assessed on the basis of a marking scheme devised by the boards.

Teachers said the exams will be tougher for the current year’s ISC batch compared to the students who had written the test before and this has prompted the schools to adopt a series of remedial measures to help students adapt to the rules and regulations of the board test.

Some schools are making the Class XII board examinees practice answering sample papers released by the council itself. They are made to write the answers  on answer scripts also prepared by the board. Schools are also holding mock tests and unit tests on a regular basis to give an idea to students what to expect in the 2023 board exam.

Gerry Arathoon, the CISCE secretary and chief executive said the council is a student friendly board and students will have no problem in writing the test as schools have got sufficient time to make up the loss caused due to the learning gap.

 “ There was a learning gap but this will have no impact on the performance of students. It is true that the ISC batch will write a full length board exam for the first time. The council answer scripts are available in the schools and they can be used to help the students to adapt to the examination,” Arathoon told EducationWorld.

The 2023 ISC will start on February 13. Father Rodney Borneo, principal, St. Augustine’s Day School, Shyamnagar said the learning loss over the last two years was reflected in the performance of the students in the recently conducted internal and terminal exams.

“After noticing the trend we have conducted a number of tests using the sample question papers and answer scripts released by the council to prepare the students to be ready to write the ISC exams. We are hopeful that the students will have no difficulty in writing the exams,” he said.   

At least two schools said they are also giving emphasis on teaching the students time management while solving the sample papers so that students practice finishing the papers on time. 

According to Ranjan Mitter of Future Foundation School,  considering the fact that the present Class XII students did not have to attend the board exams during their tenth standard , a section of students were found not ready for the board exam. “We have planned a number of remedial measures for these students,” said Mitter. Though, he said the learning gap had no impact on most students of his school.

Sujoy Biswas of Rammohan Mission High School said since students have been used to answering questions online and using excess gadgets  during the online classes in the pandemic, his institution is focusing on improving students handwriting, among other things to ensure that they don’t face any problem in the board exam.

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