CHENNAI: School Education Minister Anbil Mahesh Poyyamozhi on Monday announced that Tamil Nadu’s Class 12 examinations for 8.8 lakh students will be held from March 13 to April 3 next year. Class 11 examinations will be held for 8.5 lakh students from March 14 to April 5, and Class 10 examinations for 10 lakh from April 6 to 20.
A total of 27.3 lakh students are expected to write the exams. For Classes 11 and 12, students from 7,600 higher secondary schools will write examinations in 3,169 centres. Class 10 students from 12,800 schools were allotted 3,986 centres. All examinations will be three hours-long, from 10.15 am to 1.15 pm. However, 10 minutes will be provided to students for reading the question papers, and five minutes for verification of their particulars.
Addressing media, the minister said “Practical examinations will start in February and are expected to go on till March third week. CEOs, HMs, and teachers were asked to ensure that portions are completed on time. Unlike last time, there won’t be reductions in the portions.” Students, teachers, and parents must work together to deliver good results, he added.
Asked about continuous complaints from teachers that they are unable to concentrate on teaching duties due to administrative work, the minister said that there is bound to be friction when a new system is introduced. “We are trying to collect data to improve the education system. There will be practical difficulties, however, we will try to improve and strengthen the technology to address such complaints,” he said, referring to the system of converting all records online.
Talking about the State slipping from level II to III in the Performance Grading Index (PGI) for the academic year 2020-21, Anbil Mahesh said that this assessment was conducted before the DMK regime. There will be an improvement in the next year, he said.
He added that there would be no changes in the examination pattern, for now. “We improved the syllabus on a par with other boards. We received feedback on changing the exam pattern, it can’t be done immediately as it will disturb students,” said Anbil Mahesh.
On allegations of the TN government implementing the National Education Policy (NEP), he said that State clearly mentioned it was opposed to NEP’s features including the National Entrance-cum-Eligibility Test (NEET), three-language policy, and public examinations. “It is childish to say that the State is implementing NEP when we are trying a new initiative,” he mentioned.