EXAMINATION AND ASSESSMENT

The HEIs are currently following various methods for examination and assessment suitable for the courses and programmes as approved by their respective statutory bodies. In assessing the performance of the students in examinations, the usual approach is to award marks based on the examinations conducted at various stages (sessional, mid-term, end-semester etc.,) in a semester. Some of the HEIs convert these marks to letter grades based on absolute or relative grading system and award the grades. There is a marked variation across the colleges and universities in the number of grades, grade points, letter grades used, which creates difficulties in comparing students across the institutions. The UGC recommends the following system to be implemented in awarding the grades and CGPA under the credit based semester system.

Letter Grades and Grade Points

• Two methods -relative grading or absolute grading– have been in vogue for awarding grades in a course. The relative grading is based on the distribution (usually normal distribution) of marks obtained by all the students of the course and the grades are awarded based on a cut-off marks or percentile. Under the absolute grading, the marks are converted to grades based on pre-determined class intervals. To implement the following grading system, the colleges and universities can use any one of the above methods.

• The UGC recommends a 10-point grading system with the following letter grades as given below:

  Grades and Grade Points

  Letter Grade	Letter Grade
  O (Outstanding)	10
  A+(Excellent)	9
  A(Very Good)	8
  B+(Good)	7
  B(Above Average)	6
  C(Average)	5
  P (Pass)	4
  F(Fail)	0
  Ab (Absent)	0

• A student obtaining Grade F shall be considered failed and will be required to reappear in the examination.

• For non credit courses ‘Satisfactory’ or “Unsatisfactory’ shall be indicated instead of the letter grade and this will not be counted for the computation of SGPA/CGPA.

• The Universities can decide on the grade or percentage of marks required to pass in a course and also the CGPA required to qualify for a degree taking into consideration the recommendations of the statutory professional councils such as AICTE, MCI, BCI, NCTE etc.,

• The statutory requirement for eligibility to enter as assistant professor in colleges and universities in the disciplines of arts, science, commerce etc., is a minimum average mark of 50% and 55% in relevant postgraduate degree respectively for reserved and general category. Hence, it is recommended that the cut-off marks for grade B shall not be less than 50% and for grade B+, it should not be less than 55% under the absolute grading system. Similarly cut-off marks shall be fixed for grade B and B+ based on the recommendation of the statutory bodies (AICTE, NCTE etc.,) of the relevant disciplines.

Fairness in Assessment:

Assessment is an integral part of system of education as it is instrumental in identifying and certifying the academic standards accomplished by a student and projecting them far and wide as an objective and impartial indicator of a student’s performance. Thus, it becomes bounden duty of a University to ensure that it is carried out in fair manner. In this regard, UGC recommends the following system of checks and balances which would enable Universities effectively and fairly carry out the process of assessment and examination.

• In case of at least 50% of core courses offered in different programmes across the disciplines, the assessment of the theoretical component towards the end of the semester should be undertaken by external examiners from outside the university conducting examination, who may be appointed by the competent authority. In such courses, the question papers will be set as well as assessed by external examiners.
• In case of the assessment of practical component of such core courses, the team of examiners should be constituted on 50 – 50 % basis. i.e. half of the examiners in the team should be invited from outside the university conducting examination.
• In case of the assessment of project reports / thesis / dissertation etc. the work should be undertaken by internal as well as external examiners.

COMPUTATION OF SGPA AND CGPA

The UGC recommends the following procedure to compute the Semester Grade Point Average (SGPA) and Cumulative Grade Point Average (CGPA):

where Ci is the number of credits of the ith course and Gi is the grade point scored by the student in the ith course.

where Si is the SGPA of the ith semester and Ci is the total number of credits in that semester.

• The SGPA is the ratio of sum of the product of the number of credits with the grade points scored by a student in all the courses taken by a student and the sum of the number of credits of all the courses undergone by a student, i.e
• SGPA (Si) = Σ(Ci x Gi) / ΣCi
• The CGPA is also calculated in the same manner taking into account all the courses undergone by a student over all the semesters of a programme, i.e.
• CGPA = Σ(Ci x Si) / Σ Ci
• The SGPA and CGPA shall be rounded off to 2 decimal points and reported in the transcripts.

ILLUSTRATION OF COMPUTATION OF SGPA AND CGPA AND FORMAT FOR TRANSCRIPTS

Thus, SGPA =139/20 =6.95

Thus, CGPA = 20 x 6.9 + 22 x 7.8 + 25 x 5.6 + 26 x 6.0 + 26 x 6.3 + 25 x 8.0/ 144 = 6.73

• 1. Computation of SGPA and CGPA
  2. Illustration for SGPA
  3. Illustration for CGPA