Opinion Express View: CBSE’s decision to experiment with open book format is welcome
The scheme will require pedagogical changes and demand more creativity from teachers. Their role will not be restricted to being mere transmitters of information in textbooks
The assessment of the analytical abilities of students could also become a test of their writing and language skills. 
Examinations should be seen as a part of the overall academic assessment of students. The Indian examination system, however, especially from senior secondary school onwards, was designed as an elimination process in the early years of the last century — it’s a product of times when higher education avenues were far fewer and jobs even scarcer. With minor tweaks, this system continues even today.
The toll taken by such elimination tests on the mental health of students is well-documented. In 2022, for instance, an NCERT survey revealed that around 80 per cent students in grades 9 to 12 suffer from exam-related anxiety. The Central Board of Secondary Education’s (CBSE) decision to conduct a pilot study to test the feasibility of open book exams (OBE) for Classes 9 to 12 is, therefore, immensely welcome. The pilot will reportedly be conducted in November-December for select subjects.
OBE experiments were conducted as early as the 1930s in institutions such as Rabindranath Tagore’s Visva Bharati. However, such examinations are today held only in select higher education institutions. In India’s school system, OBE is a relatively new concept. The CBSE did allow students of Classes 9 and 11 to refer to study material during annual tests in 2014.
The examination authority, however, discontinued the practice three years later because of its “inability to cultivate critical faculties” amongst students. The Board’s new move fits in with the paradigm shift envisaged by NEP 2020 — though the policy does not explicitly mention OBEs, it lays store on transiting from rote-based information gathering to competency-based learning and developing analytical skills.
The OBE pilot is also in line with the NEP’s emphasis on making learning processes more student- and teacher-centric. The scheme will require pedagogical changes and demand more creativity from teachers. Their role will not be restricted to being mere transmitters of information in textbooks. Instruction will, instead, be more about mentoring and facilitating the young, all of whom may not learn at the same pace.
The assessment of the analytical abilities of students could also become a test of their writing and language skills. Educators will have a big role in making sure that this does not aggravate older forms of inequality and work against NEP’s inclusivity-centred approach. For this, they will also need to read answer scripts more carefully and empathetically.
Periodic upscaling of teachers’ skills is, in fact, one of NEP’s emphasis areas. The CBSE has also said that it will take feedback from teachers after the first round of the OBEs. In the coming months and years, the examination body and other education planners should hold more conversations to fine-tune this reform and make it more effective.
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