By Our Reporter
Shillong: Following constant pressure from various education institutions in the state, the North Eastern Hill University (NEHU) has decided to explore possibilities of introducing the central evaluation system (CES) for marking the answer scripts. Initially this will be limited only to a few subjects and is likely to be implemented within the coming year.
Informing this here on Monday, sources from NEHU stated that introducing the CES for the annual examinations is not an easy task as it involves man-power, cooperation of the teachers, proper planning, right location for implementing this system besides others.
“There had been instances when NEHU had adopted the CES earlier for subjects like English but the system was suspended following complaints from teachers regarding the timing and location”, sources informed.
The source, however, informed that NEHU has decided to adopt the CES for semester system which is set to be introduced next year in the month of August in three locations-Shillong, Tura and Jowai.
For annual system, the CES will be carried out either at the Old Bijni Campus or other educational institutions making it convenient for the teachers to attend to their duties since NEHU is quite distant from the city centre.
“We are exploring the possibilities of introducing the CES for the annual examination system and if it is done, it will be limited to only a few subjects but this depends on the acceptance of the examiners”, he added.
Meanwhile, Principal of St Edmund’s College Dr S Lamare told this scribe here on Monday that the CES had been suggested by many educational institutions of the state for a long time now but due to some difficulties, the system has not yet seen the light of the day.
“We have suggested to NEHU to revamp the whole system of evaluation and NEHU had assured that they would look into the matter, but after a while the matter was forgotten,” Dr Lamare said.
Admitting that there are loopholes in the manner in which scripts are being evaluated, Dr Lamare said, “On several occasions, we have seen that after mass re-evaluation, the total marks of the students increase by 30 per cent. I believe that introducing the CES will streamline the evaluation and rationalisation process. This would also relieve the students and the examiners from going through the process of re-evaluation.
What is good about this system is that NEHU would opt for the previous total marks of a student if his or her marks are reduced after re-evaluation.
On the same note, sources from St Anthony’s College have mentioned that some of the students who came to the college with 80 and 90 percent end up with only 35 and 40 percent after the announcement of the 1st year results.
“Dissatisfied with the percentage, the college had no other option but had to officially send the scripts back to NEHU for re-evaluations”, sources said adding that previously, an individual student would opt for re-evaluation but owing to the high cost, the college had to send the scripts of the deserving lot along with an official letter to NEHU.
Stating that there is a jump from class XII to BA 1st year, the source said in subjects like English and Khasi teachers do not expect a student who came in with high percentage to score 80- 90 percent but they don’t also expect them to drop to 35-40 percent’.
Claiming that there is no standard template of evaluation, the source informed that like MBOSE, the same system should be followed in under-graduate level too. Teachers should be made to attend the orientation programmes to discuss the model pattern of evaluation as is done with MBOSE. This would enable early declaration of results.
Further, the source also mentioned that the scripts are often corrected by non-sanctioned teachers despite provisions set by NEHU that only experienced teachers having completed 3 years are eligible to correct scripts.
“This happens because teachers take the scripts home and sub-contract the work to others having little knowledge about what they are evaluating,” the source added.
Meanwhile NEHU officials have defended their stance saying that refusal by experienced teachers to undertake the evaluation process has compelled NEHU to use the services of selected teachers who are qualified to evaluate the scripts.
Commenting on the delays of the results this year, NEHU officials said the delay is mainly in the Arts streams specifically because of English since it is a vast subject involving many teachers. Besides, some of the scripts were returned without being evaluated. Hence NEHU had to re-send the scripts to other teachers.
However, the Principal, St Edmund’s College said the delay is possibly linked to the system of improvement followed by NEHU. “I think, if this system is done away with the question of delay would not arise”, he added.