Dummy schools can’t replace educational experience offered by full-fledged school system: CBSE

Success in competitive exams should not come at the cost of quality education and overall development, the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) said in a statement Thursday, warning against the rise of dummy schools — institutions where students are enrolled on paper but skip regular schooling to focus on private coaching.

The Indian Express had reported on Thursday that Harsh Jha (17), a student, had scored 100 in Paper 1 of the Joint Entrance Examination (JEE) Main after enrolling in FIITJEE’s coaching programme while attending a dummy school in Nangloi.

In a statement, the CBSE said that Jha had enrolled at S G N Public School in Nangloi, an institution that was disaffiliated last year after a surprise inspection found it was sponsoring non-attending students, besides violating multiple other Board norms.

The statement asserted that while coaching institutes may aid preparation, “they cannot replace the comprehensive educational experience offered by a full-fledged school system”.