An ETS like body may soon be formed to conduct national level exams in India.
The HRD minister Kapil Sibbal has said that the ministry has decided to put in place a national testing authority as a statutory body that will conduct all kinds of exams.
Notably, ETS (Educational Testing Service) is the world’s largest non-profit educational testing and assessment organization which develops various standardized tests primarily in the United States for K–12 and higher education. It also administers international tests including the TOEFL (Test of English as a Foreign Language), TOEIC (Test of English for International Communication), GRE (Graduate Record Examinations) General and Subject Tests, and The Praxis test Series — in more than 180 countries, and at over 9,000 locations worldwide.
Body to start work under the aegis of CBSE
Gradual evoloution into a separate body
According to reports, initially the CBSE (Central Board of Secondary Education) will monitor its functioning but with time the body will evolve into a complete separate authority catering to the national requirements of exams.
Meanwhile, the authority will not take over the task of conducting the new exam proposed in place of IIT-JEE and AIEEE as there is scarcity of time but will help the CBSE in research. It will also provide assistance to the various state boards in improving their standards. The process of conducting exams will be started later on. CBSE chairman Vineet Joshi said, “It will be an Indian ETS. It will do research for preparing question papers, administer and conduct exams.”
It may be mentioned here that the IITs have reached on a consensus to merge the IITJEE & AIEEE with a SAT like test with 40% weightage to academics and 60% weightage to the entrance exam. This new mode of selection method is expected to be followed for selecting students in IITs, NITs and IIITs.