HYDERABAD: In a major relief for students appearing in the SSC Class X board exams starting from May 17, the Telangana government on Wednesday decided to reduce the number of question papers from 11 to six for the 2020-21 academic year. With this, there will only be one paper for each subject.
According to the new board exam format, each of the six papers will carry 80 marks, while 20 marks for each subject would be based on internal assessment. This comes to a total of 600 marks, of which 480 are for the boards and 120 will be based on internal assessments.
Earlier, there were 11 papers. Except for the second language, all the other five subjects had two question papers. Each subject except for the second language had papers for 40 marks, while 20 marks were for internal assessment.
Exam duration increased
The Directorate of School Education (DSE) also increased the duration of the board exams by half an hour from 2 hours and 45 minutes to 3 hours and 15 minutes. The syllabus, however, remains the same. DSE officials said that 30 per cent of the syllabus got covered through online classes and the rest 70 per cent is being taught through conventional classes and also online.
More choice for questions
Since eight months of the academic year were lost due to the prevailing COVID-19 pandemic, the DSE has decided to give more choice for questions this year. It also asked officials to frame board exam questions from the core concepts of the syllabus for all subjects as the online classes started from September 1.
The SSC Board has released the examination schedule for Academic, OSSC and Vocational Candidates - Regular and Private. The SSC Public Examination will begin on May 17 with the first language and continue till May 27, DSE officials said.