VIJAYAWADA: The Summative Assessment examinations, which were started in all the schools across the State from Saturday, marred by technical hurdles, irking both the students and school managements.
After question paper leakage in the Summative Assessment-1 examination held September created a big storm, the State government cancelled the examination. And the SA-2 has been made as SA1 and the examinations. The SA-2 exams, started on December 16 in all the schools, will end on December 22.
The State government is conducting examinations for 6th, 7th, 10th class students in descriptive type and for 8th and 9th class students, the examinations are being held in objective type for 80 marks.
In fact, the School Education department will send the OMR sheets in the name of student with a barcode. However, majority of students didn’t receive OMR sheets in their names on the first day of the examination. In a few cases, some students received more than one OMR sheet.
M Nancharaiah, Principal of Municipal High School in Vijayawada, said, “The arrangements for the examination were good. However, a few students didn’t receive OMR sheets for the examination. We made them write the exam on white paper after arranging OMRs for them.”
To reduce exam stress, the Andhra Pradesh State Council of Education, Research and Training (SCERT) had decided to do away with one of the three Summative Assessment exams, which is part of the CCE (Continuous and Comprehensive Evaluation) system, introduced as part of the educational reforms to ensure all-round development of students.
The decision was taken following leakage of the question papers in the recently-held summative examinations in the corporate educational institutions. Many private schools were involved in the leakage of question papers as they want to get more marks for students of Classes VIII and IX in the SSC.
The Summative Assessment will be conducted only for 80 marks. The Internal Assessment marks will be calculated from the four formatives and one summative (SA-I). The 20% internal marks will be calculated from 280 marks (four formative and one summative. i.e. SA-I. (4x50=200, 1x80=80; total 280 marks). The grade will be given on an eight-point scale.
“On the first day, there were a few problems with the 8th and 9th class examinations as they were in objective mode. By Monday, we will rectify them and make sure that everything goes smoothly. Through this method, we have ended question papers leaks and copying,” said Sairam, DEO of Srkakulam district.