A staggering number of 35 lakh grade 10 students in India didn’t make it to grade 11th, 27.5 lakh students failed exams, and 7.5 lakh students didn’t appear, an Union Government analysis of Board Exam Results 2022 revealed. At the Higher Secondary level, 23.4 lakh students dropped after grade 12th due to exams, 18.6 lakh students flunked, and 4.8 lakh students did not wish to appear for assessment, the report further revealed. These students studying in different State and Central Boards of the country faced difficulties such as differences in their curriculum, syllabus, and assessment criteria, the report by the Ministry of Education (MoE), pointed out. “The government is working on rolling out a uniform evaluation system for all 60 school boards in the country by November-December this year,” Sanjay Kumar, secretary, School Education, Ministry of Education, told reporters. The National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT) has constituted an assessment regulator, PARAKH, for this merger. According to the Ministry, students face difficulties in preparing for higher education competitive examinations such as Common University Entrance Test (CUET), Joint Entrance Examination (JEE) and National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET) due to differences in the State and Central school boards. The Ministry has released the report to provide a rationale behind the move. As per the report, 11 states in the country- which follow different State and Central school boards, accounts for 85% (30 lakh) of the dropouts. These include Uttar Pradesh (5.9 lakh), Bihar (five lakh), Madhya Pradesh (4.4 lakh), Gujarat (2.6 lakh), Tamil Nadu ( 2.2 lakh), Rajasthan (two lakh), Karnataka (two lakh), Assam (1.8 lakh), West Bengal (1.9 lakh), Haryana (one lakh), and Chhattisgarh (one lakh). Furthermore, the failure rate in open school boards at both Secondary and Higher Secondary levels is significantly high in comparison to regular boards under Central boards, the report claimed. “There is large deviation in performance of students between the boards in the same State. This might be due to different patterns and approaches followed by boards,” the Ministry said. The higher failure rate in State Boards, possibly due to low Pupil Teacher Ratio, teachers training, and teachers per school has impacted low gross enrollment ratio (GER) and India’s ranking in the global indices, the Ministry said. Hence, under the recommendations of the National education Policy (NEP) 2020 steps are being taken towards standardisation of exam boards to build quality workforce for their global acceptance. Follow us on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn