Seven students from Mumbai score 99.8 pc in ICSE exam

Dr. Joseph Emmanuel, Chief Executive and Secretary at the Council, said, “The council is simply replicating a practice followed by many other boards, including international boards. There are so many students having scored marks with a marginal difference of merely a few points. The council decided to do away with ranking business to avoid unhealthy competition.”

In Maharashtra, a total of 28,588 candidates appeared for the ICSE exam from 265 schools and 3,840 students appeared for ISC exam from 70 schools. The ICSE recorded a pass percentage of 99.96 whereas in ISC it was 99.71. Girls have outdone boys in both exams with each having only 11 students who were reported to be unsuccessful.

“More than 80 percent of schools have secured 100 percent results. This indicates high performance across schools, irrespective of introducing difficult analytical questions,” said Emanuel noting observations of the Council result this year.

At Podar International School in Nerul, 26 students have scored 95 per cent and above whereas there are 68 students scoring above 90 percent. (Express File Photo)

Schools from the city echoed the opinion as they shared their results emphasising on the considerable number of students scoring 90 percent and above in ICSE as well as in ISC (Indian School Certificate – Class 12), which too was declared on Monday.

Principal of Jamnabai Narsee School, Kalpana Patange said, “The number of students scoring 90% and above have gone up in ICSE as well as ISC in spite of the Board introducing MCQs as a compulsory component along with critical thinking and application-based questions.”

At Bombay Scottish School in Mumbai which has two students scoring 99.8 percent, there are a total 16 students scoring above 99 percent. Whereas, 164 out of 218 students from this school secured 90 per cent and above. In ISC, 66 students out of 127 secured 90% and above at this school. Principal of the school, Sunita George, said, “This year, papers at ICSE and ISC had more questions on higher order thinking. There were changes in paper pattern with addition of MCQs too. Despite challenging papers, students have done exceptionally well. In ICSE we have 75 percent of our students who have scored above 90 percent whereas in ISC this is 49 percent of our students.”

At Podar International School in Nerul, 26 students have scored 95 per cent and above whereas there are 68 students scoring above 90 percent. Whereas, 16 scored above 90 per cent in ISC. At St. Mary’s school, 69 students have secured above 95% and 74 have secured above 90%. At Campion School, 39 students have scored above 90 per cent.

Seven city students with 99.8 score

The Bombay Scottish School Mahim has two boys–Karan Philip and Sukrit Khanna–among the 99.8 scorers from the city. While Karan is all set with a plan to study for JEE in order to pursue engineering for higher education, Sukrit has decided to continue with the same school for ISC in science stream. “I am not sure of higher education plans as yet. But I like science, so I will continue studying it for now,” said Sukrit, an enthusiastic Piano player who lives in Prabhadevi.

Happy with her score, Goyal has already started preparing for CUET as she aspired to join Delhi University to study Economics.

Karan, a resident of Malabar Hill, will shift to the state board to prepare for JEE as he wants to pursue engineering and also aspires to participate in the International Mathematics Olympiad. “I was expecting to score above 99 percent and studied accordingly following textbooks recommended by school,” said Karan, who loves to read books during his free time.

For Ayushi Joshi from Lilavatibai Podar school, who was expecting to score about 97 percent, the results on Monday was a surprise. Daughter of CA father, Ayushi is determined to pursue engineering and decided to prepare for JEE. “I did read some books from commerce before I realised that I am more inclined toward science,” said Ayushi, who indulges in self-learning piano in her free-time.

Param Bhaiwal from Podar International School in Nerul studied with a goal to secure perfect 100 marks in all subjects and has managed to get the score, except in English. “I did not worry about rank or competition, once I set my goal,” said Param who aspires to pursue Computer Science engineering from IIT Bombay due to his love for computers. “Even during my free time, my extra-curricular activity involves learning new concepts about computers. Currently I am learning Python,” he said.

Other students from Mumbai with the same score are Janmejay Kothari from Cathedral and John Connon School and Kimaya Bauva from Sulochanadevi Singhania School in Thane and Tithi Agrawal from Dhirubhai Ambani International School.

High scorers in ISC

Even as Council did not declare merit list for the ISC result too; among high scoring students from city in three different streams are–Ayaan Waris (99.75 per cent in Science stream) from Cathedral and John Connon School, Rehaan Singh (99.75 per cent in humanities) from Sulochanadevi Singhania School in Thane and Aayati Goyal (98.75 per cent in Commerce stream) from Jamnabai Narsee school. Happy with her score, Goyal has already started preparing for CUET as she aspired to join Delhi University to study Economics.

Against odds

Among high scorers, with 97.4 percent score Kaushiki Patel’s success story is worth mentioning for overcoming all odds stacked against her. Due to premature birth, Kaushiki has been suffering from Retinopathy of Prematurity (ROP) which led to her complete blindness by the age of 1. A resident of Santacruz, Kaushiki studied at the Prime Academy school in Andheri where her mother believes that she received all the support in academics. “It is important to not get stressed over exams,” said Kaushiki, who appeared for the exam on a laptop with the help of a reader. Technology has been of great help for her to study with software which reads books to her. Kaushiki, who loves subjects like literature and psychology, wishes to join St. Xavier’s College in Mumbai to pursue Arts.