 "Did CBSE miss the warning signs? Teachers raise questions over OSM dry run")
Teachers who took part in the dry run of the Central Board of Secondary Education's (CBSE) Online Screening Mechanism (OSM) have alleged that the exercise focused mainly on testing server capacity. They did not sufficiently evaluate operational issues that later surfaced when the system was implemented nationwide.
The claims differ from CBSE's account of the pilot programme.
The Board has maintained that the dry run helped identify weaknesses in the platform and informed several improvements before its full-scale rollout.
The OSM platform, introduced to facilitate digital evaluation of board examination answer scripts, has recently come under criticism after students and teachers reported portal glitches, mismatched answer books and issues related to scanned copies.
One teacher who participated in both the pilot exercise and the subsequent evaluation process said the trial did not adequately test how the platform would perform during large-scale implementation.
"The dry run was just to check whether the servers could handle the load. They did not analyse all the problems that could arise during actual checking," the teacher said.
The pilot was conducted in Delhi in January and involved representatives from five schools.
According to CBSE, teachers from Kendriya Vidyalayas, Jawahar Navodaya Vidyalayas, government schools and private institutions participated after undergoing training on the platform.
However, several participants claimed that no detailed feedback was collected from them after the exercise.
Jasper Jordy, a Mathematics Trained Graduate Teacher (TGT) who took part in the dry run and later assessed Class XII answer scripts through OSM, said one of the key differences between the pilot and actual evaluation was the quality of scanned answer books.
"During the dry run, the sample size was small, and the scanned copies were much clearer. During the actual evaluation, many scanned answer sheets were not of the quality that we had been promised. We were told the copies would be HD quality," he said.
Jordy explained that evaluators were given the option to reject blurred or unclear scans and send them back for reprocessing.
However, he noted that the decision was left to individual teachers.
"Some teachers may have proceeded with unclear copies to avoid delays and complications," he said.
Another teacher associated with the exercise alleged that the dry run lacked an independent monitoring system.
"A portal was provided to school heads for monitoring, but CBSE itself did not monitor whether teachers had completed proper training or whether the dry run was being conducted effectively," the teacher said.
According to the teacher, the exercise largely concentrated on testing server performance instead of identifying practical challenges that might emerge during implementation.
"They checked whether the server could take the load. The system is not only about servers.
They did not analyse the kind of problems that appeared below the surface during actual implementation," the teacher added.
The allegations gain significance in light of recommendations reportedly discussed during deliberations on the OSM project.
Documents reviewed by ANI indicate that the CBSE Governing Body had suggested introducing the system first in subjects with fewer answer books as a pilot before expanding it to a wider scale.
Despite this recommendation, the Board moved ahead with a nationwide rollout for the 2026 board examinations after initiating training programmes in January.
Class X and XII board examinations were conducted between February and April, with answer scripts evaluated through the OSM portal. After results were announced in May, the platform faced criticism over technical issues, including crashes and complaints related to scanned answer books.
In a document uploaded on May 18, CBSE said the dry run had been designed specifically to examine the feasibility of the system and identify areas that required modification.
The Board stated that teachers were trained before a two-day pilot was conducted across five schools.
It added that senior principals were appointed as observers to oversee the exercise and submit reports on the platform's suitability along with recommendations for improvement.
According to CBSE, the dry run served as a blueprint for platform enhancements.
The Board said changes introduced after the exercise included a save option, simplified procedures for deleting marks, resolution of static IP-related issues, repositioning of marks that obscured student responses, colour coding for evaluators and reviewers, integration of marking schemes with answer books, addition of standard comments and increased server capacity.
CBSE further said teachers received training through webinars, online sessions, mock evaluations, instructional videos, circulars, doubt-clearing interactions and hands-on practice exercises.
The Board also maintained that evaluators were granted unrestricted access to the platform for practice and that answer books were digitised using specialised lamp scanners capable of scanning scripts without removing pages from their binding.
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