Examining Exams

The Indian education system, as far as the historians remember, has taken pride in various
forms of written or practical examinations. The system of monthly, periodical, quarterly, half-
yearly and annual exams is further complicated by various other competitions, dictations,
debates, spelling tests etc. This system has stood the test of time in one or the format from the
Gurukul days to the present era of rocket science, hence there must be substantial merit to the
system. An important problem that has crippled our education and examination system is that
the exams have become too repetitive, familiar and predictable. It doesn’t allow the students to
think out of the box or for any collateral thinking. If the students don’t attempt the questions in a
particular manner, as conventionally described in textbooks or as handed down from one
generation of teachers to others, the students cannot get full marks. The system doesn’t compel
you to think, contemplate and dare anything new. You have to follow the standard set of norms
to get a 100% score, and even that score doesn’t guarantee you selection in a reputed
institution.

Our examination system seems to be battling a plethora of problems, like corruption, nepotism,
multiple lines of authorities, too much reservation, vast environment, lack of modern
infrastructure, deficiency of manpower, outdated human resource skills etc. The government
must address these issues promptly and infuse more money, material and manpower to
improve the quality of exams and to uplift the morale of the examiners. Our examination system
is marred with the peculiarity of so many governing boards like CBSE, ICSE, SSC, IB etc. There
is no uniformity in the standard of exams conducted by these boards. Some educational boards
believe in moderation of marks which thus put remaining students at disadvantage if they are
competing for central resources. There is a great diversity in the difficulty pattern and curriculum
of comparable exams which is unfair to students. There must be this theory of “One nation,
One board, One pattern of exams”.

The present examination system is putting tremendous pressure on the students, thereby
endangering their physical and mental well-being and holistic development. The students are
either preparing for the exams or glued to their mobiles or laptops and hardly indulge in outdoor
games which is an alarming trend. Peer-pressure, further complicated by teacher’s aspirations
that students should realize the goals for the school and parent’s expectations that their ward
must score 100%, is playing havoc on student’s lives. Some of the medical issues being faced
by the students include headache, decreased vision, difficulty in concentration, stress-related
disorders, gastritis, developmental delays, suicidal tendencies etc. These students must
mandatorily be made to assess government helplines and counseling services and awareness
must be created amongst parents and teachers to identify these symptoms at an early stage.
The examination system should be a learning tool that should inspire the students to realize and
express their true potential rather than being an obstacle.

One suggestion that I will like to give is to generate a system of “Examining the Examiners”.
There should be a system of 360 degree appraisal of the examiners by the examinees.
Frequent feedback should be taken from the exam-going students regarding the validity,
usefulness, innovation and the content of the theory and viva-voce exams. The pattern,
curriculum and question-banks for the exams must be frequently refreshed to make it more
appropriate, scientific and user-friendly. Frequent inter-active workshops should be conducted
for the examiners and the inputs from the students should be incorporated.

Now let us move on from the annual academic examinations of the schools, colleges and
universities to the various competitive entrance exams that a student needs to clear to seek
admission to an undergraduate or post graduate course. These entrance exams are very
diverse and confusing for the students and parents alike. There has been a mushroom growth
of private and semiautonomous colleges including deemed universities over the last two
decades. Luckily from this year onwards, the NTA has directed that there will be a single
entrance exam of NEET-UG for admissions to medical courses for various colleges including
AIIMS and JIPMER. But for admission to BE/BTech courses for various engineering colleges,
apart from JEE Mains and JEE advanced, there are so many other exams conducted separately
by various institutes and private universities, like VITEE, SRMJEE, BITSAT, AIEEE, MAHE,
MHCET etc. The students need to pay, prepare and appear for these various online and offline
exams which is a tedious task. The 3 hours of the entrance exam, which includes syllabi of both
class 11 and 12 with a clause of 25% negative marking, makes or breaks the life of lakhs of
students every year. There should be a uniform and similar pattern of the board and entrance
exams and the marks obtained in periodic tests, annual exams and internal assessment must
be given more weightage in deciding the future of the students.

The discussion on utility of examination system cannot be complete without bringing out the
devilish role being played by the private coaching centers in defeating the basic concept of such
entrance exams. Whatever stream a student is pursuing, there is this unwritten rule of joining
one or the other coaching centers or study circles to help you prepare for the competitive
exams. These coaching centers charge approximately 2 lacks per year excluding the cost of
hostels for outstation students. Sometimes the poor parents are forced to raise a loan or sell a
valuable asset, thereby further aggravating the pressure on the students. Some of these
coaching centers have an agreement with dummy schools where a student need not attend the
classes regularly and still manages to appear in final board exams. These coaching centers are
indeed flourishing under the nose of central and state governments, no prize in guessing that
there exist a nexus between the businessmen running these centers, the bureaucrats,
politicians and law-enforcing agencies. Moreover, the entrance exams like NEET and JEE don’t
take the marks of class12 board exams into consideration, thereby defeating the basic purpose
of such board exams. There is hardly any motivation for students to do well in these board
exams and such boards are thus no longer sacrosanct bodies.

An ideal examination should be a continuous around-the-year process, rather than a 3 hour test
at the end of academic year. It should be able to evaluate the students on their various skills
and attributes, like spoken, written, practical, comprehensive etc. There must be scope of
collateral and out-of-box thinking. It should be transparent, user-friendly, coherent, scientific and
smart system where the individually-tailored attributes of every student finds an expression. The
examination should be the culmination of education, it should be a part and parcel of the
education system. There is a need to empower both the examiners and the examinees, and
there is a need to have regular feedback from the students, teachers, parents, counselors,
academicians, think-tanks, policy makers, administrators and all other stake-holders. The
students should be able to identify their academic tastes and richness based on these
examinations to help them pursue a branch of their choice rather than getting trapped in rat
race. The examination system must produce academic brilliants rather than generating
mediocrity. It must be refreshing, contemporary and skill-based rather than single-handedly
relying on just written content.

Another important suggestion is the need to move from the conventional offline paper-pen mode
to an online system, in accordance with the environment-friendly and green-earth directions.
Such online system of exam for all the courses, if properly implemented, will be less stressful,
prompt and transparent; thereby minimizing the chances of human errors, paper-leak and
corruption. There is a need to build up indigenous apps, software and labs to enable poor
students to practice for these online tests throughout the year. There should be an online portal
where all the students and teachers need to register and a pan-India data base with the
individual’s unique id coupled with their aadhar card etc should be maintained to stop duplicacy,
dummy entries and fraud. Frequent checks by regulating and law-enforcing bodies and strict
legislation is required so that no one can play with innocent lives.

While essaying down my thoughts in a desperate attempt to reach across the higher
functionaries of the education system, I am wondering what the future holds for me and for other
similar lakhs of meritorious students who don’t have any reservation or whose parents cannot
pay the humungous amount of donation fees. So while I hurriedly conclude my essay while
simultaneously preparing for the board and entrance exams, I will request the concerned higher
authorities to take urgent drastic steps to overhaul the entire exam system to make it student-
friendly and education-centric. The situation seems to be grim as even 99.9% makes no sense.
All the views expressed here are purely mine, though there is a sea of online content available.