The Hindu : New optional subjects in Plus Two

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Mar 12, 2003

National

National

New optional subjects in Plus Two

By Our Staff Reporter

NEW DELHI MARCH 11 Close on the heels of its decision to make it mandatory for students to take up a competency or skill-based subject to get an Indian Certificate of Secondary Education (ICSE) for Class X, the Council for the Indian School Certificate Examinations (CISCE) has now decided to introduce Biotechnology and Environmental Sciences as optional subjects in Class XI and XII. Interestingly enough, the subjects will not be limited to Science students alone but those from other streams as well.

So, irrespective of how much they scored in their Class X Boards, students will now be able to learn the basics of a subject that is being increasingly seen as the biggest job providing area in the coming decade. The Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE), too, had introduced Biotechnology at the senior secondary level last year. Offered as an optional, the subject was again open to students of all streams.

Being introduced as an optional subject along with Environmental Sciences for Class XI and XII from the coming academic session, the Board hopes to remove the rigidity dominating school systems presently. "These are times to look at a diversity enabling system instead of constraining students," said the CISCE chief executive and secretary, F. Fanthome, while adding that the idea behind making it an optional subject available for all students was to make the system more interdisciplinary than domain dominated.

"The idea is to introduce a more broad-based system, one that is constructed to grow into diversity platform and to provide avenues that will relate to the aspiring concerns of the educational sphere in this nation,'' he said.

And while Class XII students have Biotechnology and Environmental Sciences, three new competency-based subjects have been introduced for students of Class X. These include computer applications, commercial applications, economic applications and performing arts. With over 1,180 schools affiliated to it, the Board, though predominant in the South, boasts of having some of the best boarding schools in the country such as the Doon School, St.Paul's, Welhams, Mayo Girls, Rishi Valley and La Martinierebeing affiliated to it.

Printer friendly page
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

National