Dec 23, 2024 06:45 PM IST
The new rules require the school to maintain a record of students who fail, identify learning gaps, and oversee implementation of specialised support
NEW DELHI: The central government on Monday said it has abolished the ‘no detention policy’ for students in classes 5 and 8 and decided that students of these two classes who fail the annual examination will not be promoted.
Under the new rules, students who do not clear the annual exam will be given an opportunity to retake the test within two months and will remain in the same class if they fail the retest. Schools have been prohibited from expelling students until they complete Class 8.
“We want access, but we also want to improve learning outcomes among students under the New Education Policy (NEP) 2020. Through changes in the rules, we will be able to pay attention to those students who are not good at studies for some reason. I think we will be successful in improving learning outcomes among all students through this initiative,” Sanjay Kumar, secretary, department of school education and literacy, said on Monday.
The formal notification amending the Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Rules, 2010 was issued on December 16.
The Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act, 2009 first introduced the ‘no detention policy’ barring elementary school children who failed exams to repeat a class. This provision, which was supposed to shield students from the stigma of failure and encourage them to continue in school, was amended in 2019 to give states the option of deciding if they wanted to continue with the policy.
Several states and union territories including Odisha, Jharkhand, Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Karnataka, and Delhi subsequently opted to detain students who failed classes 5 or 8.
A senior government official said the new rules would apply to over 3,000 schools run by the central government including Kendriya Vidyalayas, Navaodyala Vidyalayas and Sainik Schools. The Centre has also asked states, which continue to implement the ‘no detention policy’, to scrap it too.
The fresh set of amendments requires schools to give students who do not clear the annual exam “additional instruction” and opportunity to appear for a re-test within two months. The head of the school will have to maintain a record of students who fail, “identify learning gaps,” and “personally oversee the implementation of specialised support” for such students.
“The examination and re-examination shall be competency-based examinations to achieve the holistic development of the child and not be based on memorisation and procedural skills,” the education ministry said in a notification.
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