ICSE and ISC Examinations Pass Marks to be lowered from 2018 onwards

Students now require scoring fewer marks for passing ICSE and ISC board exams. Read more to know the amendments.

11 January 2018: The Council of Indian School Certificate Examination (CISCE) has changed the pass mark for ICSE (class X) and ISC (class XII) from this year only. Earlier the council has decided to reduce the pass marks for ICSE and ISC exams from 2019 onwards.

The official notification states; “For the ICSE examination the pass marks would be 33% instead of the present 35% and for the ISC examination the pass marks would be 35% instead of the present 40%.”

It further states; “Kindly note that the change in the pass marks for the ICSE & ISC examinations will be effective from the examination year 2018 onwards and not from the examination year 2019.”

Sujoy Biswas, Principal, Rammohan Mission School said; “The council wanted students to benefit from the decision this year itself and must have brought its implementation forward by a year after confirming that it would be able to change all systems.”

Check out the official notice for ICSE and ISC exam pass marks - click here. 

Another significant change is the decision to get the evaluation of class XII practical papers (for chemistry, physics, biology and others) done by the visiting examiner(s) at the exam centre on the day of the exam itself. Feeding the numbers directly in the central server will help the board to declare the result sooner.

The Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD) has issued some directives to all boards and CISCE has decided to implement several of these. Standardizing the practice of awarding moderation and grace marks is one these. The letter stated; “Vagaries in the evaluation process, bunching of marks and spiking of marks must be completely avoided.”

The practice of awarding grade marks will continue only for borderline cases. Policies for the same would be disclosed on the respective websites of different boards. Boards have also been asked to separately show the performance of students in extra-curricular activities on their mark sheets.