As the government prepares to publish the routine for School Leaving Certificate (SLC) examinations, there are confusions about adjusting students from eight Tarai districts who missed their classes for four months.

The SLC Examination Board is preparing to publish the exam routine within a couple of days. The SLC exams this year are likely to start from the first week of April. The decision to delay the exam has been taken in view of classes that students missed after the April 25 earthquake and protests in Tarai districts.

However, education experts say delaying the schedule by two weeks will not be enough to adjust the gap created by the disruption of classes, mainly in eight districts in central and eastern Tarai districts.

Students from the Tarai districts missed around 100 school days out of 190. According to education regulations, schools should be opened for 220 days and while teaching learning activities should be conducted for 190 days.

Prof Basu Dev Kafle, an education expert, said students from the Tarai will not be able to complete the course if SLC exams begin from the first week of April. He suggested that SLC exams should either be postponed by a month or be held in two phases. “Students are facing huge burden as the Ministry of Education is trying to complete the course by running additional classes and using electronic medium,” said Kafle. “This may impact students’ performance.”

Starting on Friday, the MoE has been conducting classes through Nepal Television, Radio Nepal and local FM stations from the respective districts to cover the missed courses. Over 55,000 students will appear in SLC examinations from the eight districts.

He said the Office of the Controller of Examinations should follow the precedent set by the Higher Secondary Education Board. After the earthquake, the HSEB had conducted exams in two phases in view of the psychological impact the earthquake had left on students from the 14 most affected districts. Students from these districts were given additional one month for preparation.

Private school operators are also for following the same model. However, the MoE has argued that delaying examination schedule by more than two weeks will hamper the entire academic calendar.

Publishing his 19-point working plan, Minister for Education Giriraj Mani Pokharel about a month ago had announced that SLC results would be, however, published on time.