The month-long semester 1 exams that begin on Monday for ISC (Class XII) students has made school authorities issue Covid safety guidelines to students and parents.
The ISC exams will end on December 20.
The ICSE (Class X) exams will begin on November 29 and end on December 16.
Schools said they were trying to alert parents because if a student or a family member is not careful, there is a risk of the candidate carrying the infection to school, putting others at risk, too.
The guidelines include asking students and parents to reduce visits to malls or places where there could be a crowd unless necessary.
Loreto Convent Entally and Sri Sri Academy have had online meetings to communicate the school’s expectations from students during the exam.
“They should not visit crowded places or malls during this period because one student can put many others to risk. We are controlling the school environment and so we expect students and parents also to maintain the protocol beyond the school,” said Suvina Shunglu, the principal of Sri Sri Academy.
Schools do not want parents to crowd outside the gate during the exam.
“There is a tendency of parents to crowd at the gate and we have told them they should not do that. Also, parents who come to drop their girls should always wear a mask,” said Sister Sherly Sebastian, principal, Our Lady Queen of the Missions School, Salt Lake.
The fear for most teachers is the tendency of students to crowd together to discuss the paper after the exam.
“We have told them any celebration or discussion has to be reserved for later or over the phone and not in-person,” said Sister Sebastian.
Some schools have communicated to students the protocol that they are expected to maintain even after the exam is over and they are outside the campus.
“We have told them that even outside the school, they should not crowd to discuss the paper. Since they are using public transport, they should be careful about hand hygiene and sanitisation,” said Jessica Gomes Surana, principal, Loreto Convent Entally.
The Council for the Indian School Certificate Examinations had said that a student will have to appear in both semester exams. Exemptions will be given to those who have Covid. They would have to produce documents, including an RT-PCR report.
At Julien Day School Ganganagar, parents have specifically been told to track the movement of their children after each exam is over.
It is natural for students to want to discuss the paper that they have written. This will be an MCQ exam and naturally, they would want to know whether they have marked the correct answer.
“We have told parents that they should keep a tab on the time to understand that students are not loitering after an exam is over,” said Bobby Baxter, the principal of the school.