According to the recommendations of a 360-degree assessment committee report presented to Chief Minister Bhupendra Patel recently, government schools will soon transition from a one-way evaluation system to one in which students, parents, and classmates will participate in the assessment process of teaching and learning in addition to teachers.
As reported by The Indian Express, the assessment committee, which was established on March 3 of this year with the goal of revamping the student evaluation system, has also recommended doing away with the "ekum kasauti," or six-year-old unit test system.
With a more informal, experiment-based, ongoing evaluation, the unit test — one of the most resented educational programs in state government schools — was administered in about 40,000 primary and secondary government schools.
The committee has created a Holistic Progress Card (HPC) format for foundational, preparatory, and middle level primary schools in addition to the recommendation report.
“The panel also suggested shifting of the weightage of evaluation from written exams to practical and written exams in equal proportion”, said Jayendrasinh Jadav, educationist and Registrar at Gujarat Sahitya Akademi, Gandhinagar, who chairs the state-level committee.
Three subcommittees were set up to develop three Holistic Progress Cards for Balmandir, Classes 1 and 2, Classes 3 to 5, and Classes 6 to 8.
Officials from the education department said that a decision about the proposals' implementation will be made public following the report's submission.
In addition, the committee has stated that teachers ought to have the autonomy to choose when to provide tests outside of the four exams that are administered in a school year (twice a semester).
Ten additional people, including representatives from primary and secondary teachers' associations, make up the committee in addition to Jadhav.
Since the “ekum kasauti” was introduced in 2019–20, teachers and education experts have repeatedly protested, represented, and opposed it. As a result, the Gujarat government established a special committee to discuss student assessments other than weekly, fortnightly, and monthly exams.
