Grades for Class X from 2008: CBSE
Qualifying grades required in four out of five subjects for promotion

Agencies

NEW DELHI: 11 May : With the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) officially announcing on Wednesday its decision to introduce grading for Class X from 2008, Board examinations will finally come without the pass or fail tag for students.

The nine-point scale grading system will require students to get qualifying grades in four of the five subjects to get promoted to the next level, CBSE Chairman Ashok Ganguly said. It had been decided not to carry pass or fail on the marksheets of students, who will have four options to improve on their grades within a period of two years from their exam.

While the big change is a good two years away, the emphasis on internal assessment and examination reforms will begin to take shape from the coming Board examinations in 2006. From an extra 15 minutes being allotted to students before every exam for reading the question paper to redesigning the format of some Class X and XII papers to ensure that students can solve it 30 minutes before the three-hour time, there is much in the offing.

Addressing a press conference, Mr. Ganguly said to begin with the question paper of three Class X subjects and seven of Class XII are being redesigned to ensure that students can solve them in just two and a half hours, although the total exam timing will continue to be three hours.

Another important change from the coming Board examinations of 2006 will be the Board's decision to let students give the improvement exams for even additional subjects in Class X and XII.

Till now, students who did not do well in the additional subject were not allowed to take the improvement test, but from 2006, they will be able to so for all additional subjects.