The ISC practical examinations are to be conducted in schools maintaining all Covid safety protocols, the ICSE council said in a circular to school heads.
“The Visiting Examiners would be required to visit the school to check the size of the laboratory/laboratories and then plan, in consultation with the Head of the School and the Supervising Examiner appointed at the school, the number of batches in which the Practical Examination for the concerned subject would be conducted at the school,” said the circular issued by the Council for the Indian School Certificate Examinations (CISCE), which conducts the ISC exams, on Saturday.
“This should be done in compliance with the social distancing norm i.e. 6ft distance between two candidates, on all sides, while taking the examination.”
The circular is for the conduct of practical examinations for physics, chemistry, biology, home science, fashion designing, Indian music (Hindustani), Indian music (Carnatic), Western music, computer science and biotechnology.
The CISCE has said the practicals must be scheduled between October 25 and February 28, 2022, giving schools a window of four months for the exams.
Teachers in the city said that before conducting the practicals, the schools would need to conduct practical classes as students have had no experience of conducting hands-on experiments.
Schools said they were also waiting for a go-ahead from the state government to reopen the campuses.
However, several teachers said it might not be possible to schedule practical classes before the semester 1 exams end by December 16.
“Before the practical exams, we would want students to attend some practical classes. They first need to have knowledge of the experiments before they are examined,” said John Stephen, acting principal of La Martiniere for Boys.
“This batch (the one that will take the exams) has had no practical classes even in Class XI and so they need to do some experiments. Last year’s batch had at least attended practicals in school in Class XI,” said Aruna Gomes, principal of Loreto House.
The dates of the practical examinations — the students will appear in each subject in batches — would be finalised by the visiting examiner in consultation with the head of the school and the supervising examiner appointed at the school.
The school heads have to intimate the candidates of the dates at least a week in advance.