The chairpersons of education boards said that there is insufficient machinery – Photo: File
Karachi: The project to implement the “E-Marking and E-MR” system at the metric and intermediate levels in the province’s government educational boards has once again been disrupted, resulting in the system not being introduced in the annual exams scheduled to start in a few days.
The education department of Sindh has checked with various educational boards in Karachi and other cities in Sindh for the provision of machinery worth millions of rupees for this system several months ago. However, the machinery is still lying in boxes as the staff has not been trained to use it, and teachers have not been trained for paper moderation or paper setting.
The metric exams in the province started on May 7th and the intermediate exams will start on May 28th, it is being said that the education department has provided a very limited amount of machinery to the educational boards, which will only enable e-marking for a few hundred students once it becomes functional.
It was reported that the Karachi Intermediate Board has been provided with barely one server, while the Karachi Metric Board has been given two or three scanners and printers along with a server and a few cameras. Similarly, the Hyderabad Secondary and Higher Secondary Education Boards have also been provided with extremely limited machinery.
Keep in mind that the Karachi Metric Board prepares results for over 3 lakh students of the ninth and tenth grades every year, while over a lakh students take the metric and intermediate exams under the Hyderabad Board. Around one and a half lakh students take exams under the Intermediate Board of Karachi.
Upon contacting, the Acting IT Manager of the Intermediate Education Board Karachi told “Express” that they have received some machines and may receive more in the future, but they emphasized that a significant amount of hardware has been received, but they could not remember the current status.
One officer of the Intermediate Board had said that this time the Board will not provide MCQs on the OMR sheet but will print MCQs on simple paper because the Board does not have any instructions regarding OMR checking or e-marking, and the teachers and employees associated with it have not received any training on this.
He mentioned that for at least a couple of years now MCQs were provided on OMR sheets, but it was being done in an informal manner.
It should be clear that provision of the mentioned machinery for e-marking began for the province’s government educational boards for the 2024 annual metric and intermediate exams, but this provision remained incomplete.
The boards that conduct exams for millions of students are not provided with the required amount of machinery, and the staff that has been given the machinery has not been trained in its use. The IT or store rooms of the boards are furnished with equipment, and the education department initiated this project in collaboration with the Asian Development Bank.
For this project, a separate office has been established in Clifton, Karachi, and it has been named the “Sindh Secondary Education Improvement Project”. The project’s objectives were to provide paper setters, paper moderators, training for teachers, and technical training for IT staff at the metric and intermediate levels, but the project has faced delays.
It has now been reported that multiple trainers for paper moderators and setters associated with the educational board in Karachi have started training since May 6, but they will not be ready for the exams starting in a few days.
To assess the preparations for the annual exams in Sindh, an ِassembly was held nearly one and a half weeks ago in the presence of the Sindh Education Minister and the Minister of Universities and Boards. In the meeting, the return to e-marking in Sindh was under discussion, but the relevant ministers were not informed that no preparations had been made in this regard.
Here, the chairman of a board from interior Sindh said, “The machinery provided to us is like giving us a needle in the mouth of a camel. With over a lakh students in metric and intermediate, what can we do with a few scanners?”
“Express” also contacted the head of the Sindh Secondary Education Improvement Project, Rizwan Somro, to learn the reason behind the delay in the project. He stated that the commencement of OMR and e-marking is scheduled for 2025, and there is no delay in this regard. The machinery has been provided and training is being conducted.
When asked if he can share any documents related to this, he said he cannot share any documents. However, he suggested to check the ADP website. He was asked why a small number of boards were being provided with hardware at low cost, to which he did not provide a clear answer.
Overall, it seems that the lack of machinery training is hindering the progress of e-marking and e-MR implementation in government educational boards in Sindh.