JNTUH 'Evaluation Process' Questioned

By ANNIE SADAF | INNLIVE

Engineering students of colleges affiliated to Jawharlal Nehru Technological University-Hyderabad have sought changes in the exam evaluation system, claiming that currently professors spend hardly a few minutes to correct each paper.

Several complaints have been registered in the past about lapses in the evaluation process. Recently, members of the JNTU-H Students' Joint Action Committee (JNTU-HSJAC) shot off a letter to varsity authorities highlighting the plight of thousands of students.

"There are no particular standards set for paper evaluation. And even if there are, they are not neutral. We are evaluated based on hand writing and not on content of the answer sheet," said Moham mad Sumair, a student who started a n online petition on the issue.

JNTU-H receives nearly 15 lakh answer sheets (32 pages each) every year, for which it calls in nearly 1,100 evaluators from various col leges. As per the rules, evaluators are given 120 answer sheets each day , with eight hours to finish corrections. This means that evaluators get four minutes on each paper, which is not even close to being enough.

"Even high-scoring students have backlogs in a few papers as professors hurriedly correct answer sheets. They hardly spend over a minute on each paper, im pacting our overall results," said Vinay Kumar, a student.

Students also complained that the university charges more money for re-evaluating papers. While varsities such as Osmania University charge Rs 300 per subject for re-evaluation, JNTU-H charges Rs 1,000 for each subject.

"In many cases, students have got much better marks after reevaluation. There are students who failed during regular corrections but passed with a margin of 20 to 30 marks after re-evaluation," said R Sai Kiran, member of JNTUH SJAC. He demanded the uni versity share a soft copy of evaluated booklet with students.

Meanwhile, admitting that several complaints had been received regarding the evaluation process, JNTU-H officials said a policy change was required before evaluated answer sheets could be shared."During re-evaluation, chances are that students get higher scores because the professor gets more time for each paper. For accuracy in evaluation, we have centralised the system and have appointed chief examiners for each subject," said Anjaneya Prasad, JNTU-H director of evaluation.