HSC exams likely to be held in mid-August, says Dipu Moni

Authorities will soon discuss whether to hold the exams next year on the regular syllabus

Education Minister Dipu Moni has said the Higher Secondary Certificate and equivalent exams are likely to start in mid-August.

“The HSC exams will be held on a revised syllabus,” she said on Tuesday at the International Mother Language Institute.

Dipu Moni also mentioned that the exams were pushed back as the tests on all subjects would be held on the entire question paper instead of abridged versions.

“We will soon hold a discussion over the 2024 exams and decide whether we will go with a revised syllabus then. We want to hold the exams as early as possible. We wanted to do that this year as well.”

“This year, we might be able to hold the SSC exams in May and HSC in August. We’ll try to organise the exams closer to the usual time next year. So we’ll think about revising the syllabi next year if needed.”

On April 12, Tapan Kumar Sarkar, convener of the committee and chairman of Dhaka Education Board, said they decided to defer the HSC and equivalent exams, which were scheduled to start in July this year, by a month as the colleges could not cover the syllabi.

It was then said that a new date to start the exams will be announced later.

Before the coronavirus pandemic, SSC exams used to start in February with HSC tests in April.

The higher secondary assessments in 2021 and 2022 were based on abridged syllabi, while the number of subjects was also reduced due to the pandemic.

The 2022 HSC and equivalent exams started on Nov 6 after a lengthy delay due to the coronavirus pandemic and devastating floods in the northeast.

This year, the exams will be held on the entire syllabi but many colleges were not able to cover all the lessons, although they held in-person classes for 15 months.