University of Hyderabad (UoH) to Commence Online End Semester Exams from Sept 16

University of Hyderabad will begin the online end-semester exams from September 16, 2020. 

As reports claim, the University offered various alternatives to all its departments for conducting end-semester examinations as per their convenience.

Earlier, a high-level committee comprising by department heads, deans of various schools headed by Professor Appa Rao Podile, Vice-Chancellor, UoH was formed to make decisions on conducting university exams.

Podile asserted the university is compelled to confer degree certificates to postgraduate students only after conducting exams. The Supreme Court verdict on retaining UGC guidelines of July 6 has made the university give a second thought to conducting exams. 

Check: UoH Admission 2020

The Vice-Chancellor of UoH also stated as the apex court pronounced the verdict in the best interests of students, the university immediately decided to abide by it. Hence the university will conduct exams for final year semesters at any cost. 

UoH final semester exams will be conducted on 50 marks while the remaining 50 marks will be offered on basis of continuous evaluation of students. 

Professor Vinod Pavarala, spokesperson, UoH stated, “Most departments have decided to send the question paper to the students online and give them two to four hours of time to write their answers. They will not be expected to be on a video call or online to write answers. Instead, they will have to send a scanned copy of their answer sheet once the exam time concludes. 

Although it will be sort of an open book examination, the question papers will have an element of analysis and interpretation in it. Such that students will not be able to copy-paste from their study material. Some departments are also conducting oral exams post the theory papers to check students' engagement with the curriculum and integrity.”

As per the latest updates, University of Hyderabad will conduct online entrance exams for many of its postgraduate and integrated courses from September 24, 2020.

Earlier, it was declared UoH will hold offline Entrance Tests from September 24. The entrance exams would have been in a pen-paper mode in three sessions from 24-26 September across its 38 exam centres. As per  Professor Vinod Pavarala, spokesperson, UoH, 

The university ranks students career as the utmost priority. Hence it will not put students’ academic career in jeopardy in case authorities invalidates their degrees if followed otherwise.

He added, “The heads and deans will work out a range of flexible options to administer the examinations online and minimize the inconvenience to students.”

As per university guidelines, students who are unable to attend exams in the first phase will be allowed to attend exams to be held scheduled for October 5. 

The press release issued by UoH reads, “It may be recalled that in June the university had adopted an alternative evaluation mechanism based on continuous assessment and the cumulative grade point average (CGPA) and announced results for the batch in order to facilitate their graduation so that they could pursue further education or career opportunities. Those results will now stand cancelled.”

Meanwhile, UoH had begun online semester classes from August 20. Due to the COVID-19 spike in cases and following the worldwide lockdown guidelines, the University of Hyderabad had suspended the classes for all courses on March 15, 2020.

The task force headed by Vinod Paravala, former dean of Sarojini Naidu School of Arts & Communication, examined the health risk involved in conducting physical classes and thus has suggested the university to conduct online classes till the situation normalizes.

Also Read: UoH introduces online submission of M.Phil/PhD dissertations and theses