School exam board warns against unauthorised schools in Bengaluru

Bengaluru: The Karnataka School Examination and Assessment Board (KSEAB) has issued a warning to district-level officials to be vigilant while registering students for the Class 10/SSLC board exams, citing concerns over the existence of unauthorised schools across the state.

The board’s warning comes in light of issues from the previous year, when more than 5,000 students from around 130 unauthorised schools faced difficulties after the KSEAB failed to generate their admission tickets.

"Last year, 130 schools were identified as unauthorised because they had not renewed their affiliations, affecting over 5,000 SSLC students enrolled there," explained a senior official from KSEAB. "In the interest of the students, we gave them an additional 15 days to submit their affiliation status and allowed them to sit for the exams."

To prevent a repeat of such last-minute issues, the KSEAB has instructed Deputy Directors of Public Instruction (DDPIs) to ensure that unauthorised schools are not allowed to submit proposals for student registrations for the board exams this year. The board has also requested reports from Block Education Officers (BEOs) about the status of school affiliations.

"We have asked the BEOs for a list of schools that have renewed their affiliation and those that have not. If the BEOs fail to provide this list and any student faces issues with their exam registration, the BEOs will be held accountable," said the official.

Last year, the DDPIs sent a list of schools to generate school codes for board exams. However, the KSEAB found that 129 schools had failed to renew their affiliation. As the timetable had already been released, the board granted the schools an additional 15 days to resolve the issue. "Even after the extension, some schools failed to renew their affiliation, and students were reassigned to nearby schools to sit for their exams," the official recalled.

A large number of unauthorised schools were concentrated in the Bengaluru South and North educational districts, with 65 such schools identified in the region.

In the wake of these issues, both the private schools management association and the parents association have urged the Department of School Education to release a list of unauthorised schools. This would allow parents and students to take corrective action and transfer to other schools, if needed, before the exams.