CBSE National Heritage Quiz ends sourly

KOZHIKODE: It has been several years now since the CBSE started the prestigious National Heritage Quiz and schools and students have been participating in it zealously. But this year, it was a big disappointment to many who could not take the exam, unlike in previous years, due to technological changes in its conduct.

All these years, the national quiz was offline, but CBSE shifted it to an online platform, for the first time. However, due to server problems, several schools in the state could not complete the procedures in time. 

Registering complaints with the CBSE, almost all of them were hoping that they would get another chance to compete. However, to their surprise, CBSE ignored these complaints and declared results last week, causing heartburns among students and teachers.

CBSE conceptualised the Inter School Quiz Competition with the objective of informing the growing generation of the inter-link between their culture and heritage and the need for sustainable socio-economic development alongside modernisation.

“On the date announced, an online window was opened by all the registered schools, using specific registration number and password allocated after successful registration by the Board,” explains N.G. Ragunath, an education expert here. 

“The system generates specific registration number and password automatically once school submits the forms online. As per the direction, each school had to attend the test in their respective IT labs in their school.”

On completion of the test, the team was supposed to get the feedback including how many were correct answers, wrong answers marked and time taken during the quiz. But these procedures were halfway blocked after the server went down. 

“We were expecting CBSE to give our children a second chance as it was purely not their mistake but the technical issues on their side,” he said.  

All India Private School Association Kerala Chapter ( PSACWA) general secretary M. Abdul Nazar regretted the CBSE declaring the results without considering the grievances of students.

The Association demanded a second chance for them as they had suffered huge pain and stigma due to the technical issues. 

“The 2018- 19 academic year was among the most challenging for every school in Kerala due to repeated closures in the wake of several calamities, hartals and related issues,” he said. 

“Moving ahead with the syllabus and completing it on time, itself had become the biggest ever challenge, and in spite of that, few schools in the state dared to face the heritage quiz challenge, undergoing special and separate training procedures.” “A majority of the schools appeared for the online competition had to face the technical glitches, but still, they got no consideration in specific,” he added. 

Till the previous academic year, the competition had high participation from the CBSE students of Kerala, but this year, it has drastically come down as they were struggling to cover the syllabus.

St Mary’s Poojappura, Thiruvananthapuram, was among those who helped students to prepare for the national quiz but had to face the unfortunate server issue. 

Students started appearing for the exam on time, but the server went down now and then.  “They could not complete questions on time, and this was a similar situation to all who appeared for the test from our school,” sa-id principal Anila Sarosh. 

“We have complained to CBSE citing these issues, but there was no action.”

In spite of all these challenges and limited time, Hadi, son of Dr Rauf and a student of Bhavan's School, Poochatty, Thrissur, got selected for the National Quiz. 

“Even the school had to face the technical difficulties on the server, but he made it through,” said Dr Rauf.