Edu dept won’t upload practice tests for SSC students this year

The education department’s initiative of uploading practice papers for Class 10 students has fizzled out within a year after it began.

The education department’s initiative of uploading practice papers for Class 10 students has fizzled out within a year after it began.

HT Image

Even as the board exams are only three months away and schools are busy conducting their preliminary exams, no papers have been uploaded on the Balbharti website.

“This year, the paper pattern has changed and we have moved back to the 80-20 pattern for languages and social sciences, where 80 marks are for written exams and 20 marks for internal assessments,” said a senior official from the state board

He further added, “The schools have a fair clarity about this pattern and they are expected to convey this to the students. Hence the practice papers are not uploaded.”

Schools inform that while they have got a copy of the new paper pattern, there is no clarity on whether or not there would be practice exams.

“We have not got any circular from the department on the issue. The practice papers are extremely helpful for students to get an idea of what would appear in the exams. We hope that teachers in each school orient students well with the new revisions including the change in marking scheme,” said Sudam Kumbhar, principal at Shailendra High School in Dahisar.

Parents said that it would have been nice if the initiative continued.

“There are so many changes in the pattern every year that children tend to get confused about how the actual paper would look,” said Asawari Mhatre, a Borivali-based parent.

“We have to only rely on the school papers and the ones that private publishers release,” she added. In 2018, these practice tests had got more than 50 lakh downloads from the portal.

In the same year, the education department decided to do away with oral exams for Class 10 as a result; the students had to write 100 mark papers for all subjects.

To acquaint students with the new paper pattern, three practice tests were uploaded on the Balbharti website. This initiative was supposed to be an annual feature.

The department had also released solutions to the papers along with video tutorials to help students.

.