SSLC preparatory: Govt favours assn's question papers

The government has decided to hand over the task of preparing question papers for SSLC preparatory exams back to the Karnataka State Secondary Schools Head Masters’ Association, ignoring recommendations from experts and top officials against doing so.

The government has issued an order permitting the association to prepare the papers. The association’s question papers and procedure of conducting the exams have been subject to severe criticism in the past. There were repeated complaints regarding the quality of papers.

Top officials in the Education department had raised serious concerns, saying that the association failed to follow the blueprint issued by the department.

Not only were about five preparatory exams conducted in a year, the question papers were also not set as per the new pattern.

“There were complaints of question paper leaks. There were also instances of repetition of questions. Some teachers had approached the
department in this regard,” said a government school teacher.

P C Jaffer, commissioner, department of public instruction, had also opposed the move to let the association set the question papers. The commissioner had said that the papers, which did not follow the new pattern, left the students confused.

It was said that the papers had to be set in association with the Department of State Educational Research and Training (DSERT) and Karnataka Secondary Education Examination Board (KSEEB).

This was followed by a proposal by the commissioner to entrust the responsibility of setting the papers to subject teachers in individual schools.

Shashi Kumar, general secretary, Karnataka Associated Managements of Primary and Secondary Schools, said, “There is no transparency in the process and there are chances of the papers leaking. We conduct our own school-level preparatory exams and upload papers that can be accessed by all.”

“We conduct only one state-level preparatory exam. The rest is conducted by individual schools. One set of question paper and answer script costs Rs 35. Last time, the question paper pattern was changed in the last minute. Hence the confusion,” said Divakar, president, Karnataka State Secondary Schools Head Masters’ Association.