A CUET has its pitfalls

The National Education Policy (NEP 2020) promises that by 2040, India will have an education system that would be second to none. Obviously, our benchmarks are now the best higher education systems in the world.

Countries with a large number of world-class universities do not mandate admission to higher education programmes based solely on the scores of a single common national-level entrance test. Instead, they leave the decision to the universities. Most of them, in turn, use a holistic, multi-faceted and multi-dimensional approach to the identification and selection of students for admission in their undergraduate, graduate or research degree programmes.

At the same time, there are also countries in which the fate and future of students are decided by a single common national-level examination. Admittedly, these countries, too, have a few of the best universities in the world.

India, until now, has been following a varied system of admission in its higher education institutions. In medical education, students are admitted solely on the basis of their ranks in the National Eligibility and Entrance Test (NEET) across all kinds and types of colleges and universities and throughout the country.

In engineering, IITs, IIITs, NITs have been admitting students on the basis of their ranks in the Joint Entrance Examination (JEE), either exclusively or in combination with the marks obtained by them in the board-level examination. A vast majority of the other institutions too admit students exclusively on the merit of one or the other entrance tests of their choice.

So is the case with the IIMs and a few select business schools. They use the Common Admission Test (CAT) score, albeit in combination with other components like academic records, group discussions and personal interviews. The rest of the institutions, however, go by the merit of one or the other national, state or university-level entrance tests.

In general higher education, the selection of students differs widely across the type of programmes, higher education institutions and states in which they are located. Most central universities long gave up admitting students on the basis of board marks, arguing that the inter-board variations in marks rendered them ineffective as a basis for admission. Presently, they all conduct their own entrance tests, often for each programme separately. Delhi University is probably the only exception in admitting students on the basis of board examinations.

Ideally, the country could have invested in improving the standards and quality of assessment, evaluation and grading of various school boards, to help them become the most reliable measure of a student’s academic accomplishment and talents. Alas! That was not to be.

It was the Central Universities Act 2009 that for the first time envisaged a common entrance test for admission to universities established under the Act. It, however, refrained from making it mandatory. By the last count, 14 of the new central universities were basing their admission on the merit of a single common test called the Central Universities Common Entrance Test (CUCET). Last year, this test was conducted by the National Testing Agency (NTA).

The UGC has now made it mandatory for all the central universities to admit students in their undergraduate programmes only on the bais of the score of the Central University Entrance Test (UG-CUET) to be conducted by the NTA. Universities have also been encouraged to admit students to their PG programmes on the basis of a PG-CUET score. The NTA notification hints that a good number of central universities have opted in favour of the CUET.

NEP 2020 had argued for ‘a common principle for entrance examination with due regard to diversity and university autonomy’ and had stated that ‘NTA would conduct entrance for admission to UG, PG and fellowship in higher education’. It had, however, expressly mentioned that ‘it would be left to the individual universities and colleges to use NTA assessments for their admissions’, even though the policy had hoped that ‘the high quality, range and flexibility of NTA test would enable most universities in the country to use these common entrance exams -- rather than having hundreds of universities each devising their own entrance exams -- thereby drastically reducing the burden on students, universities and colleges, and the entire education system’.

Though the policy does not make the national-level test mandatory, the media briefing on the subject announced that ‘CUET was the first step toward a single common entrance examination for admission across all higher educations in the country, as envisaged by NEP’. Such a supple interpretation of the policy makes people circumspect about the intent and start doubting the meaning and purpose of putting higher education in the Concurrent List of the Constitution.

The fact that it is quite a hassle for students to appear in many different entrance examinations conducted by the central universities across the country and pushing the cut-off to an absurd level of 100% or above in one central university that admits students on the basis of board-level examinations, could well justify a CUET for all central universities, but proposing to extend it to all higher education institutions across the country warrants a series reconsideration.

After all the institutions of national importance and the central universities account for a mere 0.78% and 1.93% of students, respectively. The experiences and anxieties of such a minuscule segment cannot be extended to a vast majority without a thorough study of implications. After all, a few states still feel that subjecting them to a national-level entrance test for medical students has been unjust on account of merit and inclusivity.

CUET presently neither prescribes centralised counselling nor seeks to interfere with the extant admission and reservation policy of institutions. However, the hint that centralised counselling cannot be ruled out makes many institutions wary.

Critically, NEP 2020 emphasises that ‘the NTA would serve as a premier, expert, autonomous testing organisation’. Its being at an arm’s length from the government is as essential for its credibility as its ability and expertise in designing and conducting its tests objectively with due regard to quality, consistency, reliability, and validity.

Given the fact that performance in school-leaving exams are a proven determinant of lifetime success, it appears advisable to use a combined merit of CUET score and board-level marks. Finally, technology today enables on-demand examination. The NTA must conduct the test at least twice a year, as mandated by NEP 2020, to safeguard students from eventualities and also to better their prospects.

(The writer is a former Adviser (Education) in the Planning Commission)