In the view of adopting the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020, which includes doing away with the Class 10 board examination to avoid over-burdening the students by making them appear in two board examinations (for Class 10 and Class 12), the Gujarat government aims to be the leading state in the country to implement the policy suggestion and do away with the Class 10 board examination by next year.
At present, the school education has a 10+2 structure which includes 10 years of secondary and two years of higher secondary education. Whereas, the NEP 2020 suggests a 5+3+3 structure – first five years (from nursery to Class 2) to be considered foundational, next three years (Class 3 to Class 5) to be considered as preparatory, the next three years to this (Class 6 to Class 8) will be middle and the last four years (Class 9 to Class 12) to be considered as secondary education. It further suggests that a child with a minimum of four years of age should be admitted to nursery which will eventually make her appear for the Class 12 exam at the age of 18.
Bringing upon the change in the existing structure would be a tough task as it would affect a large number of stakeholders and a wide range of policymaking and changes. Although, according to the sources, the state government intends to adopt the new structure from the next academic year – 2022-23 itself, which will be commenced in around six months from now.
