The Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) has made a transformative move for students by announcing a major change in the Class 10 and 12 board exams for 2025. During the recent 'Bridging the Gap' principals’ summit in Indore, CBSE's Bhopal Regional Officer Vikas Kumar Agrawal shared these updates to ease academic pressure and improve learning outcomes.
The biggest change is a 15% reduction in syllabus across all subjects. This is part of CBSE’s ongoing attempt to reduce the academic burden on students and focus on learning the core concepts instead of rote memorization. This reduction is meant to deepen students’ understanding of subjects and to make them engage more meaningfully with their studies, Agrawal said.
There will also be a change in structure of assessment, with internal assessments now contributing 40% of the final grade and the remaining 60% based on final written exams. The goal of this change is to encourage continuous learning and to offer students many chances to demonstrate their knowledge throughout the year. Projects, assignments, and periodic tests will be internal assessments, which will be more comprehensive in evaluating student capabilities.
In addition, CBSE is also introducing digital assessments for answer sheets, which will increase evaluation efficiency and transparency. Additionally, for English Literature and Social Science subjects, an open book exam format will be trialled, with students able to use their textbooks. The point of this initiative is not to test memorization, but rather to test critical thinking and application skills.
The board also looked ahead and said that the 2025 exams will be one term and return to two term exams in 2026. This is one of several steps the district is taking to simplify assessments and provide students more chances to show what they know throughout the year.
