Exam centres should lay stress on assessing candidate’s competency: MBoSE
Shillong, May 20: The registration process for private candidates seeking to appear in the Secondary School Leaving Certificate (SSLC) examination has been started with the last date fixed as June 30.
The eligible candidates can approach their nearest notified SSLC examination centres for registration and further details, the Meghalaya Board of School Education (MBoSE) stated in a notification issued on Wednesday.
Only designated SSLC examination centres have been authorised to register private candidates.
According to the notification, the provision is meant for candidates who discontinued regular schooling due to genuine hardship, exhausted all permissible examination attempts up to 2025, or are pursuing professional sports, games, or art forms.
MBoSE said the applicants must be domiciles of Meghalaya and can submit documents such as Aadhaar card, voter ID, ration card, birth certificate, caste certificate, MHIS card, or MGNREGS job card as proof of domicile.
The Board clarified that there will be no upper age limit for admission as a private candidate, but applicants must have attained at least 15 years of age on or before December 31 of the examination year.
MBoSE has also introduced a “cooling-off period” for school dropouts. Students who discontinued studies before completing Class X will become eligible only after a waiting period calculated as “10 years minus the last class studied.”
The notification added that examination centres should place greater emphasis on assessing a candidate’s academic preparedness and competency instead of relying solely on documentary proof of the last class studied, especially in cases involving home-schooled learners, sportspersons, and non-traditional learners.
MBoSE said the cooling-off period was introduced to discourage students from prematurely leaving regular schooling solely to appear as private candidates.
