Frontlist | SPPU accepts ‘exceptional’ rise in pass percentage in Oct 20

Frontlist | SPPU accepts ‘exceptional’ rise in pass percentage in Oct 20
on Mar 17, 2021

Pune: Savitribai Phule Pune University has said it had an ‘exceptional’ increase in passing percentage in the term-end examinations held in October 2020. The authorities reasoned that the increase was due to the online-MCQ based model adopted for the examination. Sources said the passing percentage increased by almost 25% compared to the last year. A Board of Examination and Evaluation member of the university, on the condition of anonymity, said the university examinations are quite tough to clear and generally the pass percentage for all branches put together is around 30%. But, last year, in the October 2020 examination for final year students, the result was between 50% and 100%. “MSc biotechnology, which is a tough course and has generally a pass percentage of 20-22%, had a pass percentage of over 90%. There were cases of students who had failed for several years, passing the examination with almost cent per cent marks in the last examination. Hence, it won’t be wrong to say that due to lack of proctoring, students did use unfair means easily to clear the examination hence the increase in pass percentage,” the member said, adding that the condition was the same across the universities in the country. Several questions were raised by senate members about the examinations and if the university saw an exceptional number of students passing the examination. They also wanted to know if there was a proposal under consideration for the university administration to study the reasons for the increase if qualitative changes will be made in the exam system. One of the management council members replied on the behalf of the university that there was indeed a huge increase in the number of students passing the examination in 2020 and this is being studied by a committee. Two Sides To The Problem The Examination Reform Committee has already been constituted by the management council to study all this. The structure of the examination in October 2020 was such that 40% of the questions were very easy, 40% of the questions were moderately difficult and the other 20% were difficult to solve. As per the order of the government, 40% of the questions were made available to the students for preparation. Hence it was noticed that the result of the examination increased in an exceptional manner SPPU’s reply to the Senate’s question This time we saw a pass percentage increase of 20-25% in the examination results which is very high. The examinations were not proctored and that could have contributed to this increase. We have appointed a committee to study this phenomena. Meanwhile, the upcoming first-semester examination from April 11 will be proctored and hence there will be proper monitoring of students attempting it Sanjay Chakane, member of board of examination and evaluation for the university