CBSE review committee to provide third party intervention in paper setting process – Times of India

Talking to Education Times, Sanyam Bhardwaj, controller of Examinations, CBSE, says, “The review committee will consist of members having expertise in conducting examinations and in academics. This third-party intervention would help the Board and streamline the paper setting.”

While the review committee will assess the processes, it would not be involved in the actual setting of the question papers which is the task of subject experts who are senior academics in CBSE affiliated schools/other educational institutes with what Bhardwaj calls “a high level of integrity”. “The question papers will be prepared as per the recommendations of the Committee to avoid recurrence of such above mentioned anomalies.” Evidently, to maintain the secrecy in the entire paper setting process, no CBSE official is involved, it is said.

The Board has detailed guidelines that demand the question papers to be based on the syllabus and as per the sample papers. Also, it should be free from gender and political bias. Bhardwaj says, guidelines also emphasise the fact that the questions must be class-neutral, region neutral, not touching upon the controversial, social and critical issues. “The subject experts in case of the recent issues arising out of the question papers had missed the guidelines. This has made the review committee all the more pertinent as it would help strengthen the remedial process of paper setting and evaluation. The committee would be like the third eye to independently scrutinise the entire process,” he adds.

Pavnesh Kumar, former controller of Examinations, CBSE, and former secretary, Board of High School and Intermediate Education, Uttar Pradesh, underlines the measures in place to offset the aforementioned situations. “CBSE gives elaborate written instructions when the paper setting assignment is handed to the subject experts to avoid discrepancies.”

“Once the question paper is set, it is examined by moderators to see if the content coverage is as per the design of the Board, be it in terms of the number and types of questions, and the marks and weightage that are allocated to each content unit,” says Kumar. He adds that the job of paper setting is both strenuous and time consuming due to which not too many academics are inclined to take it up, nor is there much of a financial incentive for the task.

Suggesting that the Board should carefully engage experts to evaluate each set of question papers before going to print, Kumar says that the subject experts should be made permanent employees of the Board so that they are more responsible towards their work.” “Additionally, the controller of examinations should have more academic manpower for the smooth functioning of the examination conducting machinery,” he adds.