The portions removed from the syllabus will not be part of the topics for Internal Assessment and year-end Board Examination

The Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) is reducing the syllabus for classes 9 to 12 by 30% for the 2020-21 session to make up for the academic loss due to Covid-19, the government announced today.

“Considering the importance of achieving the level of learning, the syllabus has been rationalised to the extent possible up to 30% by retaining the core concepts,” the Union Ministry of Human Resource Development said in an official statement.

“Looking at the extraordinary situation prevailing in the country and the world, #CBSE was advised to revise the curriculum and reduce course load for the students of Class 9th to 12th,” HRD Minister Ramesh Pokhriyal Nishank said in a post on Twitter.

The changes made in the CBSE syllabi have been finalised by the respective Course Committees with the approval of the Curriculum Committee and Governing Body of the Board, the HRD Ministry said in an official statement.

The ministry had earlier invited suggestions from all educationists on the reduction of syllabus on social media; more than 1,500 suggestions were received.

The board has advised the heads of schools as well as teachers to ensure that the topics that have been reduced are also explained to the students to the extent required to connect different topics. “However, the reduced syllabus will not be part of the topics for Internal Assessment and year-end Board Examination,” the HRD Ministry stressed.

The ministry made it clear that the Alternative Academic Calendar and inputs from the NCERT on transacting the curriculum using different strategies shall also be part of the teaching pedagogy in the affiliated schools.

For the elementary level of Classes 1 to 8, schools will follow the Alternative Academic Calendar and Learning Outcomes specified by NCERT. The revised syllabus is available on the CBSE Academic Website www.cbseacademic.nic.in.